A General Theory of interlingual Mediation 9783865969194, 9783865960634

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SPRACHWISSENSCHAFT

A General Theory of interlingual Mediation

Sergio Viaggio

Frank &Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

Sergio Viaggio A General Theory of interlingual Mediation

Sprachwissenschaft, Band 1

Sergio Viaggio

A General Theory of interlingual Mediation

Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

By Courtesy of University of Alicante-Publicaciones (Spain) Por cortesía de Universidad de Alicante-Publicaciones (España) http://publicaciones.ua.es

ISBN 978-3-86596-063-4 I SBN 3-86596-063-4

© Frank & Timme GmbH Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur Berlin 2006. Alle Rechte vorbehalten. Das Werk einschließlich aller Teile ist urheberrechtlich geschützt. Jede Verwertung außerhalb der engen Grenzen des Urheberrechtsgesetzes ist ohne Zustimmung des Verlags unzulässig und strafbar. Das gilt insbesondere für Vervielfältigungen, Übersetzungen, Mikroverfilmungen und die Einspeicherung und Verarbeitung in elektronischen Systemen. Herstellung durch Atelier für grafische Gestaltung, Leipzig. Printed in Germany. Gedruckt auf säurefreiem, alterungsbeständigem Papier. www.frank-timme.de

To Mariano García Landa, my master; To Hans Vermeer, who believed in this book and so selflessly helped me find a publisher; To Danica Seleskovitch, who will never be able to read these pages that owe so much to her; and to León Chattah, who helped me believe that I could actually write it.

PREFACE Welcome, dear reader to this, the English incarnation of my first book. You are about to enter the result of thirty years of meditation based on the daily practice of translation and simultaneous interpretation, as well as the teaching of both. The immediate antecedents of the concept that I shall be developing before you are relevance theory, “skopostheorie,” and, decisively, García Landa’s theory and model of the speech act. Thanks to his revolutionary concept of speech as a perceptual process I have seen that interlingual mediation and its subtype, translation, consist in achieving a specific relationship, not between “texts” or “utterances,” but between what the original speaker means to have understood and what the mediator’s interlocutor finally understands. The relationship that counts, then, is not between signs but rather between mental representations. The corollary, I submit, is an important one: Equivalence is but the result of a translator’s endeavour to achieve such relationship and it may or may not evidence itself as a shared feature of the original and its translation indeed, such “equivalence” may well not be translational at all. That is why the concept has been as elusive in the mind of translation scholars as difficult to pinpoint in the actual texts produced by translators. Thus, not only the original is “dethroned” -as it had been by “skopostheorie”- but also the translated text, which now occupies a merely vehicular place. Moreover, comprehension itself becomes qualified, since I establish a distinction between spontaneous speech comprehension (or, if you will, the comprehension of directly intended, “official” sense) from the more or less open series of metarepresentations it gives rise to. This simple categorisation allows us, I think, to overcome several additional theoretical problems, such as untranslatability. Ideational, propositional -or, as García Landa calls it, “noetic” meaning- is always re-verbalisable. Otherwise we would be unable to synchronise collective intentionality and there would be no science - let alone civilisation. Things become more complicated when what counts are the deeper, emotive layers of what we, consciously or unconsciously, wish or do not wish to have understood or understand. The corollary is a simple one: Translation -even of poetry- is almost always possible; what is not always possible is, rather, useful translation. Useful for the specific metacommunicative purposes of the flesh-and-blood human beings that communicate with each other in specific situations. Translation practice -or, rather, the practice of interlingual mediation- is only interested in practical translation - i.e. in useful or relevant translation. And in order to be useful, translation must inevitably be something more, something less and something other than “translation.” This is the foundational axiom of my theory. Can such “something more,” “something less” and “something other” be conceptualised? Do they, moreover, share the same constitutive rule encompassing in turn the constitutive rule of translation proper so that we may call them by the same name? What difference is there between strictly

translating and translating not so strictly? I believe I have a theoretical answer. I am sharing it in the practical hope that it will help mediators perform more effectively and that it will contribute to buttressing our profession scientifically, socially and -indeed!- financially. Part One is addressed mainly to translation scholars and teachers (although I have tried to make it accessible also to practitioners and students not all too familiar with the theoretical field, whence its style that scholars may find perhaps too colloquial and, no doubt, repetitive). The Introduction takes a brief look at the schools that have influenced me. It is the roughest part. Chapter I presents my theory of communication and my development of García Landa’s model of the speech act. It is the book’s cornerstone. Chapter II extrapolates the theory and model to mediation and interlingal mediation. Chapter III presents the concept of quality and the relevant criteria following from the theory. Part Two presents the application of the theory and model to the widest possible gamut of situations and texts, and is addressed mainly to teachers and students. Chapter IV deals with oral communication. Unfortunately, I have found it impossible to “write” examples, especially of simultaneous conference interpreting, since, by definition, the quality of an interpretation is decisively a function of the paralinguistic and kinetic configuration of the utterance. Chapter V approaches written and hybrid mediation; there examples abound. Some readers will find them too prolix, in which case they should not waste too much time on them. I seek to corroborate that the theory and model apply equally well to all cases. The “piece de resistance,” however, is Chapter VI, devoted to interlingual literary mediation. It is, also, the Chapter in which I fall into the temptation of making literature myself. I hope that you may read it as I wrote it – an impassioned but smiling plea. This text has known countless avatars in two languages and owes much to the implacable and sensible criticisms of many staunch readers. Yet above all, as I have acknowledged, it owes a lot to Mariano García Landa, and not only to his voracious, surgical and visionary mind. Let me restate once again my deeply felt gratitude to my master. And let me also re-state my deepest gratitude that other giant, Hans Vermeer: without his kindness and unflinching support, this book would have never reached you. Lastly, a piece of advice: Have always at hand the offprint with the symbols and their definitions.

It is now almost 30 years that my article on a “skopos” theory of translation was published (1978) and 20 years that the “Grundlegung einer allgemeinen Translationstheorie” by Katharina Reis and Hans J. Vermeer followed (1984). Since then I have been looking for a new and more advanced approach to Translation Studies and I think I have now found it in Sergio Viaggio’s “Teoría General de la mediación interlingüe” (Alicante 2004) of which the English version is now published as “A General Theory of Interlingual Mediation”. Viaggio’s approach is partly based on previous works by García Landa. It presents a holistic theory of oral and written translating in which Viaggio distinguishes the routine equivalence practice of primarily literal translation from his own functional “mediation”. Written in a vivid style with excellent examples from Viaggio’s own 30 years long experience of interpreting (and translating), amongst others for UNO organizations, it is specially intended for students (but by far not restricted to them only). Some few formula’s may look strange at first sight, but they can easily be mastered by the careful reader. – The first chapter of the book presents Viaggio’s theory. I take it to be the most important part, a detailed and systematic functional explanation of translation and translating. For economical minded readers the 3rd chapter offers considerations on a possible cost-benefit approach with additional thoughts on ethics in translation and some practical effects derived from them. – The second part of the book contains further details on oral translating (interpretation) and last but not least what I suspect to be Viaggio’s secret love: literary translating and translations. – I heartily recommend the book to all who deal with oral and written translation problems. I’d like to remind the reader of a phrase by Ralph Waldo Emerson quoted by Viaggio: “They reckon ill who leave me out: when me they fly, I am their wings.” Istanbul, 21st of November 2005 Hans J. Vermeer

TABLE OF CONTENTS PREFACE ............................................................................................................................ .

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PART ONE. THE THEORY AND MODELS. THE PRECURSORS INTRODUCTION ...................................................................................................................... 15 Eugene Nida: dynamic equivalence ................................................................................. 16 Katherina Reiss and Hans Vermeer: Skopostheorie ........................................................ 16 Zinaida Lvovskaya: sense as the combination of the situational, the pragmatic and the semantic ................................................................................... 19 Ernst-August Gutt: Relevance theory as a substitute of translation theory..................... 20 Danica Seleskovitch and Marianne Lederer: “la théoríe du sense” ............................... 21 Mariano García Landa: speech and translation as perceptual processes ...................... 22 García Landa’s models................................................................................................. 27 Bruno Osimo: translation as a semiotic activity.............................................................. 30 TO TRANSLATE IS, INDEED, TO SPEAK IN ORDER TO RE-SAY WHAT HAS BEEN SAID IN ANOTHER LANGUAGE – BUT THIS IS NOT ENOUGH .............................................................. 34 CHAPTER I. SPEECH, COMMUNICATION, TRANSLATION AND MEDIATION WHY I THINK IT ADVISABLE TO DEVELOP GARCÍA LANDA’S MODEL ..................................... 37 Perception and metarepresentation ................................................................................. 38 The unconscious ............................................................................................................... 41 The contextual effects of comprehension ......................................................................... 42 There is more to meaning than ideational content ....................................................... 43 The rest is silence ......................................................................................................... 44 What really counts is the metacommunicative framework .......................................... 45 TRANSLATION AND MEDIATION ............................................................................................. 45 RELEVANCE THEORY DEVELOPED ......................................................................................... 47 The overall importance of qualitative effects................................................................... 49 SOME ADDITIONAL THOUGHTS ON SIMILARITY AND IDENTITY ............................................... 50 THINKING FOR SPEAKING ...................................................................................................... 56 THE SEMANTIC REPRESENTATION SHIBBOLETH ..................................................................... 58 THE OBJECT OF SPEECH PERCEPTION ..................................................................................... 60 A TRIVIAL EXAMPLE .............................................................................................................. 63 MY DEVELOPMENT OF GARCÍA LANDA’S MODELS ................................................................ 65 The developed sub-model of written communication....................................................... 68 THE PERQUISITES OF SPEECH PERCEPTION ............................................................................. 71 Virtuality and acts ............................................................................................................ 74 Speech is larger than language........................................................................................ 75 The underrated importance of the graphic and typographic or paratextual configuration ........................................................................................ 75 A MORE PRECISE DISTINCTION BETWEEN MEANING AND SENSE, CONTEXT AND SITUATION ... 76 An utterance ..................................................................................................................... 77 This side of the utterance ................................................................................................. 78 The speaker’s persona .................................................................................................. 78 The speaker’s pragmatic intention and conscious and unconscious motivations ........ 78 The speaker’s direct intended sense (LPI) ................................................................... 79 The speaker’s indirect intended sense .......................................................................... 80 At the utterance ................................................................................................................ 80 The utterance’s objective meaning............................................................................... 80 The utterance’s literal meaning .................................................................................... 82

The utterance’s deep meaning...................................................................................... 82 Around the utterance........................................................................................................ 84 The linguistic context ................................................................................................... 84 The extra-linguistic context.......................................................................................... 84 The speech act’s setting................................................................................................ 85 The speech act’s circumstances.................................................................................... 85 The relevant encyclopaedic base.................................................................................. 85 The microworld ............................................................................................................ 86 Culture.......................................................................................................................... 86 That side of the utterance ................................................................................................. 87 The interlocutor’s persona............................................................................................ 87 The interlocutor’s acceptability criteria ....................................................................... 87 Sense as comprehended by the interlocutor ................................................................. 88 The contextual effects of comprehension..................................................................... 88 The articulation of the speech act .................................................................................... 89 The double articulation of the utterance....................................................................... 89 The multiple articulation of the speech act .................................................................. 89 THE ASYMMETRY BETWEEN MEANING AND ABILITY TO MEAN AND WILLINGNESS AND ABILITY TO UNDERSTAND ......................................................... 91 SO IS THERE ROOM FOR PERCEPTUAL IDENTITY AFTER ALL?.................................................. 93 A NON-TRIVIAL EXAMPLE: THE SAD CASE OF DEREK BENTLEY ............................................ 94 PRACTICAL CONSEQUENCES FOR MEDIATORS ........................................................................ 97 Some authentic cases........................................................................................................ 99 WHAT IS, THEN, TO “TRANSLATE” ....................................................................................... 101 THE PROBLEM OF SIMILARITY REDUCED TO SIZE ................................................................. 103 SIMILARITY, ISOTOPY, EQUIVALENCE AND REPRESENTATION .............................................. 105 The status of formal equivalence.................................................................................... 106 RELEVANT IDENTITY - TRANSLATION AS MEDIATION .......................................................... 107 A NEW DEFINITION OF EQUIVALENCE AND ADEQUATENESS ................................................. 111 A MEDIATOR’S DEONTOLOGICALLY ACCOUNTABLE FREEDOM ............................................ 112 A DOOR WIDE OPEN FOR RESEARCH ..................................................................................... 113 CHAPTER II. THE SPECIFICITY OF INTERLINGUAL MEDIATION ALL THAT TRANSLATORS DO IS NOT TRANSLATION ............................................................. 117 TRANSLATION AS A MODALITY OF INTERLINGUAL MEDIATION ............................................ 121 INTERLINGUAL MEDIATION AS SOMETHING MORE (OR LESS) THAN TRANSLATION ............... 129 Interlingual mediation as more than translation ........................................................... 129 Interlingual mediation as less than translation.............................................................. 130 Interlingual mediation something other than translation .............................................. 131 CONVERGENT, COMPATIBLE AND DIVERGENT FACE ............................................................ 133 ACTIVE AND PASSIVE MEDIATION ........................................................................................ 134 Covert and overt mediation............................................................................................ 137 IT IS ALL A MATTER OF POWER ............................................................................................ 137 Largo al factotum della città!......................................................................................... 138 THE MODEL OF INTERLINGUAL MEDIATION ......................................................................... 142 THE COMPETING CLAIMS ON THE MEDIATOR’S LOYALTY..................................................... 144 THE EMOTIVE INTEREST: THE COGNITIVE ENGINE’S FUEL .................................................... 145 CHAPTER III. QUALITY: THE CRUCIAL ISSUE DESCRIPTIVE STUDIES CANNOT BEGIN TO APPROACH THE LIMITATIONS OF ANTISEPTIC DESCRIPTIVISM................................................................ 147

THE CHASM BETWEEN PROFESSIONAL AND EXPECTANCY NORMS ........................................ 153 THE FIRST NORMATIVE STATEMENTS ................................................................................... 157 QUALITY IN INTERLINGUAL MEDIATION .............................................................................. 159 The first thing to identify: the metacommunicative framework...................................... 161 The decisive importance of the hermeneutic package.................................................... 161 PEDAGOGICAL CONSEQUENCES ........................................................................................... 163 The evaluators profile .................................................................................................... 165 PART TWO. THE MODEL APPLIED CHAPTER IV ORAL MEDIATION THE ONTOLOGICAL PRIMACY OF ORALITY ........................................................................... 167 THE MODEL OF ORAL MEDIATION ........................................................................................ 168 RELEVANCE TO THE LEFT, RELEVANCE AT THE CENTRE AND RELEVANCE TO THE RIGHT ..... 170 ORAL “TEXTS” TOO CAN BE INSTRUMENTAL OR DOCUMENTARY ......................................... 172 MODES OF INTERPRETING .................................................................................................... 174 Dialogue interpretation.................................................................................................. 174 Telephone interpreting ............................................................................................... 176 Consecutive interpretation ............................................................................................. 176 Simultaneous interpretation ........................................................................................... 178 Whispered interpretation ............................................................................................ 183 The competing efforts ................................................................................................ 183 The physical presence of the simultaneous interpreter in all kinds of interpreting....... 185 ARCHETYPICAL SOCIAL SETTINGS ....................................................................................... 187 Legal interpreting........................................................................................................... 187 Medical interpreting....................................................................................................... 189 Conference interpreting ................................................................................................. 191 Conference interpretation at international organisations ........................................... 192 Different kinds of international organisations............................................................ 194 The multilingual interpreter - an inevitable shift from quality to quantity ................ 195 The inevitable bane of relay interpreting ................................................................... 196 SI for the media .............................................................................................................. 198 Specific constraints .................................................................................................... 198 Specific expectancy and professional norms ............................................................. 200 Media interpreting: a new, particularly sophisticated specialisation ......................... 201 Remote conference interpreting ..................................................................................... 202 SIGN AND TACTILE LANGUAGE INTERPRETATION ................................................................ 203 THE AUSTRALIAN MODEL - THE SENSIBLE WAY OF THE FUTURE .......................................... 204 THE GAPING HOLES IN INTERPRETER TRAINING ................................................................... 205 Post Scriptum: A paradigmatic case.............................................................................. 205 CHAPTER V. WRITTEN MEDIATION AN UNNATURAL ACT ........................................................................................................... 209 The dialogic nature of texts............................................................................................ 210 THE MODEL OF WRITTEN MEDIATION................................................................................... 211 THE MODEL APPLIED ........................................................................................................... 212 Instrumental translation.............................................................................................. 212 A more problematic case: Instrumental cum documentary translation...................... 220 Documentary translation proper................................................................................. 225 Hyper-documentary translation.................................................................................. 225 Documentary cum literary translation........................................................................ 238

Translation as active mediation ..................................................................................... 244 ORALITY VERSUS TEXTUALITY ............................................................................................ 254 Hybrid forms .................................................................................................................. 255 Translation for performance on the stage or the screen ............................................. 255 Film translation .......................................................................................................... 258 AN INFORMAL TOUR OF THE THORNY ISSUE OF THE UNIT OF TRANSLATION ......................... 260 CHAPTER VI. THE PUDDING OF THE PROOF: LITERARY MEDIATION LITERARY SPEECH ............................................................................................................... 263 FORM IN LITERATURE .......................................................................................................... 269 THE FORMAL CONSTRAINTS OF THE NOETIC SPACE .............................................................. 277 AND NOW FOR SOMETHING COMPLETELY PRACTICAL.......................................................... 281 THE SEMANTIC REPRESENTATION SHIBBOLETH REVISITED .................................................. 301 ERROR IN LITERARY TRANSLATION ..................................................................................... 305 A DOSE OF PUSHKIN ............................................................................................................ 309 Nabokov’s genial blunder .............................................................................................. 309 Habeas corpus! .............................................................................................................. 317 More Pushkin ................................................................................................................. 368 Nabokov redeemed ......................................................................................................... 372 IRRECONCILABLE DIFFERENCES ........................................................................................... 375 AND NOW FOR SOME SHAKESPEARE .................................................................................... 377 AN EXTREME CASE .............................................................................................................. 382 CONCLUSION ....................................................................................................................... 391 REFERENCES ..................................................................................................................... 395

PART ONE THE THEORY AND MODELS THE PRECURSORS “[E]l asunto de la traducción, a poco que lo persigamos, nos lleva hasta los arcanos más recónditos del maravilloso fenómeno que es el habla.” José Ortega y Gasset, Miseria y esplendor de la traducción. [The discussion of translation, to whatever extent we may pursue it, will carry us into the most recondite secrets of that marvellous phenomenon that we call speech. José Ortega y Gasset, The Misery and the Splendour of translation (translated by Lawrence Venuti)] “The problem... has troubled translation theory historically. People practiced translation, but were never quite sure what they were practicing” Edwin Gentzler, Contemporary Translation Theories, p. 44.

Introduction What is translation? What is the sufficient/necessary relationship between two texts or utterances that we may call one the translation of the other? What, in short, is a translator to do in order for a translation to exist? Whatever our answers to these questions, they are bound to prove wanting in one crucial respect: We, translators (including interpreters), although mostly engaged in “translation,” do things other than “translating.” What is it that we do that we may call it by one name? What is the Searlean “constitutive rule” of whatever it is translators and interpreters do always, in writing or orally, semantically or communicatively, documentarily or instrumentally, literally or freely, literarily or pragmatically, visibly or invisibly, overtly or covertly? It is an age-old question that has received different answers, but, to date, none of them has been wholly satisfactory. The problem lies in that, regardless of the explicit or implicit definition -i.e. of the theory- governing the activity of translators across the centuries, and especially now that translation has become directly linked to the development of the productive forces of society, translators have had to do a myriad things that have escaped any definition. One is, however, certain: translation is a form of communication between human beings, and not simply an operation between languages - or between oral or written texts. It is this perspective that spurs the best modern approaches. It would be too cumbersome and of little practical value to review here the linguistic views that see translation as a substitution of signs belonging to different codes (Catford (1969), Vinay and Dalbernet (1957), Newmark (1982, 1988, etc.), Malone (1986 © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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and 1988), Komissarov (1973 and 1980), and others), or the descriptive ones (Toury (1995), Hermans and the “manipulationists”) that give up altogether on seeking a constitutive rule of translation and, with it, any notion of equivalence or adequacy and, with it, any value judgement on the aptness of a translated text or of a given translation method. I shall limit myself, therefore, briefly to review those who have directly influenced the theory I shall be presenting. I will begin with the scholar who takes the first step toward a notion of translation as communication. Eugene Nida: dynamic equivalence Nida (1964, 1977, and 1996) -who still views translation basically as an operation between Chomskyan deep structures- has the enormous merit of having understood that it is not enough to reproduce the message, but that it is necessary to take into account the effects of comprehension on the intended interlocutor. Since such effects are not only a function of what is said, but also of the interlocutor’s knowledge, ability and sensitivity, it behoves the translator to determine how to re-say what has been said so that the effect remains the same. This forces him to “manipulate” the propositional and referential content of the original with a view to comprehension by a specific interlocutor (or group of interlocutors), i.e. to discard, due to its communicative sterility, “formal equivalence.” Nida is the first one to say the there is no such thing as the translation, that there are possible translations that will be more or less apt or effective depending on the reader they address. The purpose of translation, however, remains to keep invariant the “spirit of the original,” which necessitates that its comprehension by different readers in different languages and situations produce the same or equivalent effect. The contradiction in terms lies in that effect can never be the same or equivalent1 - not even among the readers of the original. Besides, translation may well pursue different effects. Nida’s “dynamic equivalence” (first with respect to content and second with respect to form) is, then, but one possible form of translational equivalence. Katherina Reiss and Hans Vermeer: Skopostheorie This is what the founders of skopostheorie are the first ones to assert. Translation is not only a function of the interlocutor’s knowledge, ability and sensitivity, but also of his interests (or of those of whoever commands the translation). The original ceases to be the word of God (or of the author - which so far had been the object of equal reverence and fear) to become a sheer “information offer”: “A text can be defined as an ‘information offer’ addressed to a receiver by a producer. The text… produced by the translator offers, in turn, information on the meaning and, in a certain way and under specific circumstances, also on the form of the source text, and is, therefore, an information offer on an 1

See Hu (1992a and b, 1993a and b, and 1994).

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information offer” (Reiss and Vermeer 1996:14, re-translated from Spanish by me, SV).

Which the authors express symbolically as: Trl. = OIf(OI o)

Explaining that “we use these pseudoformulae to express in a way both concise and easy to remember the essential aspects of our theory” (ibíd. 1996:62). A receiver will have “understood” an information if he has been able to interpret it as sufficiently coherent in itself and with respect to his situation2. Now, since translation is an information offer on a preceding information offer, it is supposed to evince some sort of relationship to the original text. Vermeer calls this relationship “intertextual coherence.” The intertextual coherence that is to be established between an original and its translation is defined as the relationship obtaining between a translation and the source text, which depends, on the one hand, on the interpretation of the original text by the translator and, on the other, on the translation’s skopos. The theory is resumed as follows: “A translatum is conditioned by its skopos. A translatum is an information offer in a target culture and language on an information offer in source culture and language. A translatum reproduces an information offer in a nonunivocally reversible way. A translatum must be coherent in itself. A translatum must be coherent with the source text” (1996:101).

It should be pointed out that Reiss and Vermeer are the first ones explicitly and duly to incorporate and weigh most metacommunicative factors of interlingual communication (missing are the unconscious ones and the qualitative effects of comprehension), as well as those of a paralinguistic and paratextual nature, and to understand that nowhere it is written that a mediator must necessarily adopt the speaker’s intention. A decisive shift thus takes place from the speaker to the interlocutor - which legitimately alarms many. If all that counts -or, in any event, what counts the most- is the functionality of the target text and the mediator determines it, what safeguard is there against arbitrariness? Once the God author is dead, who is there to tell the difference between right and wrong? Nord (1991) comes to the rescue by introducing the ethical concept of loyalty. The deontological assurance that a mediator is to exercise his freedom in a responsible way is his loyalty to the parties to a translational event: speaker, originator, and interlocutor. But, what happens when their interests do not coincide or, worse, clash? In the eyes of authors such as Newmark, loyalty 2

Information is thus seen as something abstract,bereft of intentionality: Information is, and it is up to the reader to interpret it as sufficiently coherent in itself and with reference to the situation. It is no longer a matter of understanding someone else’s intention. This is, I believe, the basic limitation of skopostheorie. © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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to whomever pays turns the mediator into a “mercenary.” Yet, the same can be said, for that matter, of a lawyer. A supreme loyalty is therefore missing: loyalty to the profession itself. The de facto transformation of a translator into an interlingual mediator necessitates, besides, distinguishing all that he is called upon to do other than strictly translating. Holz-Mänttäri thus introduces the distinction between translation and translational action: “Translators... bridge the gap between situations where the differences in verbal an non-verbal behaviour, expectations, knowledge and perspectives are such that there is not enough common ground for the sender and the receiver to communicate effectively by themselves… The translator’s mediatory role does not always involve translating in any literal way… Translating in the narrower sense always involves the use of some kind of source text, whereas translational action may involve giving advice ad perhaps even warning against communicating in the intended way” (quoted and translated by Nord 1997:7).

As can be appreciated, what is missing is a satisfactory definition of this specifically translational “intertextual coherence.” What condition must this coherence meet so as to determine that a second text is a translatum of a first text? In view of the translator’s metacommunicative “independence” (more often than not subject, indeed, to the client’s brief), then, everything would seem to go. It is not, of course, what Reiss and Vermeer claim, but they fail duly to clarify it. The problem, however, is not actually that one, but that between original and translation there may be countless types of coherence. As it can obtain between two texts in different languages one of which is not a translation of the other. Or between texts in the same language produced in conformity with all the other rules of the theory (an abstract, a paraphrase, etc.). If so far prefunctionalist approaches “fell short,” skopists, it would seem, “overshoot.” The problem lies always in an unsatisfactory definition of equivalence, which the authors discard in favour of the concept of adequacy to the skopos, itself due to a -to say the least- vague definition of meaning (that I know of, the only one to state explicitly what she understands by it is Reiss, who speaks of “cognitive meaning” (as translated by Nord, 1997:10)). The theory and model I am about to suggest incorporate skopostheorie lock, stock and barrel - with an important theoretical caveat: As all theoreticians before García Landa, skopists see translation as a relation between texts. With García Landa, I think that we are dealing with a relation between intended and comprehended meaning, i.e. between speech percepts that speakers seek to produce in their interlocutors by means of the utterances or texts they come up with. In other words, coherence between two texts is not the condition of translation but rather its outcome. This having been said, I very much doubt that when it comes to apply our respective concepts, my analysis were to differ from that of any skopist. Another aspect that our theories have in common is that they 18

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are, at the same time, theories of quality: A skopos may be more or less apt, and a translation may accomplish it better or worse. In this crucial aspect, my coincidence with skopists is absolute. Zinaida Lvovskaya: sense as the combination of the situational, the pragmatic and the semantic Already in the first page of her Problemas actuales de la traducción (1997), Lvovskaya explains that the basic problem lies in the distinction between meaning (linguistic, objective) and sense (extralinguistic, subjective). Sense is the end result of the motivation and purposes (i.e. skopos) of the subject’s communicative activity in a specific situation. Two subjects will hardly react identically in the same situation, but neither the absence of bi-univocal correspondence between meaning and sense nor the latter’s subjective nature will stand in the way of communication if both interlocutors share the necessary extralinguistic knowledge. The best assurance of sense comprehension is a communicative situation shared by both interlocutors and their belonging to the same culture. However, since there are no two subjects who share the same knowledge, experience or values, sense as intended by a speaker will be more or less different to sense as comprehended by each of his interlocutors, which is a general feature of verbal communication. No message is understood, then, perfectly and in its entirety. Lvovskaya defines sense as the combination of a semantic (linguistic) and a pragmatic (extralinguistic) components, which are different in nature and hierarchical relationship, the semantic component being subordinate to the pragmatic one. Between both there is each time a univocal relation, which leads to postulate the existence of a third component that enables them to be understood, since the pragmatic component -extralinguistic and subjective- is not observable, whilst the semantic one does not signal unequivocally the speaker’s intention. This third component is the communicative situation, which is endowed with “meaning” for the interlocutors insofar as they belong to the same culture, despite the fact that each one of them partly interprets this situation in a subjective way. The situation has a triple role: it motivates, determines and actualises the sense of an utterance. The components of the sense structure do not exist separately from each other, but their hierarchical relationship is such that the situation is paramount. The pragmatic component -or “the author’s conceptual (intentional-functional) programme”- depends on the interaction between the speaker’s subjectivity and the situation, while the semantic component occupies the lowest rank, since it depends on the situation and the speaker’s conceptual programme. The situational substructure invariably includes the whole gamut of factors observed by functionalists, except that one never can tell beforehand which ones will acquire what weight in each specific instance. The pragmatic substructure has, in turn, two components: intentional and functional, endowed, respectively, with their own hierarchical structure. There is, however, a main intention and a dominant function, which is invariably correlated to the main intention. In order © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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to realise his main intention, a speaker produces successive utterances. The semantic substructure is also hierarchically organised: it consists of the referential, connotative and extensional meanings - the latter one being supreme, in that it is that which the unit of sense acquires in the linguistic context. Communication consists in establishing the chain [intended] sense utterance – sense [comprehended]. Translation consists in establishing a new chain: sense [now as intended by the translator but identical to that which he has understood] - utterance in the target language - sense [as comprehended by the new interlocutor]. It happens that of all three components of sense the variable one is, precisely, the main one: the situation. The semantic structure may be variable (in fact, in view of the change in language, in translation it always is). The other one, the pragmatic structure, ought to remain as constant as possible, but it cannot even in monolingual communication. Nevertheless, communication -monolingual or mediated- begins and ends in sense (i.e. in the minds of the interlocutors). The corollary is that translational equivalence will be always dynamic and relative, and can be defined on the basis of the fundamental principle of translation: maximum fidelity to the speaker’s conceptual programme and acceptability of the translated utterance by the interlocutor - a position similar to Nida’s, except that no longer on the basis of language, but of the speaker’s intention to say. This is Lvovskaya’s genuine merit: understanding that translation is a bridge not between texts -much less languages- but between mental states or representations. As we can see, Lvovskaya does not foresee a heteroscopic and heterofunctional translation, since, by definition, it would be disloyal to the speaker’s conceptual programme. To boot, she does not make explicit the relationship that is to obtain between intended and comprehended sense: How similar or analogous must they be in order for communication or translation to succeed? To answer this question, a fundamental factor must be addressed that Lvovskaya leaves out: The interlocutor’s subjectivity, who, besides knowing what he knows, has his own “comprehension programme,” motivations and interests. Ernst-August Gutt: Relevance theory as a substitute of translation theory Gutt (1990, 1991, 1996 and 2000) holds that Sperber and Wilson’s relevance theory is sufficient to explain translation, which thus no longer requires a theory of its own. According to Sperber and Wilson, utterances can be used as representations in two basically different ways: 1) an utterance may propositionally resemble a state of affairs in the world - in which case language is used descriptively, and 2) an utterance may propositionally resemble another utterance - in which case language is used interpretively. In the first instance, the utterance describes a (real or imaginary) state of affairs in the world, in the second - it reproduces, as it were, the propositional content of a previous utterance, or, if you wish, of a previous description of a (real or imaginary) state of affairs in the world. In other words, the “truth” -and, eventually, relevance- of 20

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a descriptive utterance is, basically, a function of the state of affairs it describes and the way it describes it, whilst that of an interpretive utterance lies in the way it propositionally resembles another utterance. This leads Gutt to define translation as second-degree interpretive use: A translator says, by means of an utterance in the target language, what the original speaker communicated by means of an utterance in the source language - the translated utterance is thus supposed interpretively to resemble the original one. It is assumed, therefore, that a translated utterance interpretivley resembles its original. Parallel texts viz., the different language versions of an owner’s manual- in which language is used descriptively to “describe” the device and the correct way to use it, would not be translations (regardless of the fact that they may have been arrived at by translators basing their own descriptions on the description verbalised in the source language)3. The definition is theoretically tight, but it poses a practical problem: According to it, most translators do not translate at all, and most translated texts are not really translations. The definition, by the way, tallies neatly with those of Nida, Lvovskaya and, as we shall see, the Parisians and García Landa, whereby a translation’s relevance -i.e. functionality- is limited to allowing the speaker’s intended sense propositionally to resemble sense as comprehended by his interlocutor - regardless of the state of affairs described by the original speaker and of the metacommunicative intentions of both speaker and interlocutor(s). There is a second problem as well: If interpretive resemblance is to be assessed exclusively at the propositional level, how are we to assess literary translation? What about formal resemblance? Where is the translatologically relevant difference between two Spanish texts, one in prose and the other one in sonnet form, both “interpretively” resembling the same original English sonnet? The problem, to my mind, is to be found in that in its canonical formulation (Sperber and Wilson 1986/1995), relevance theory leaves aside the non-cognitive contextual effects of comprehension. A theory of translation that turns its back on qualitative effects, turns it on aesthetic effects, and this makes it incapable of conceptualising literary translation. Danica Seleskovitch and Marianne Lederer: “la théoríe du sense” The revealing experience of consecutive interpretation leads Seleskovitch and Lederer (1984, 1986 and 1989) to discover that translation is the transmission or reproduction of sense (assimilated to the speaker’s vouloir dire). If, despite the fact that he cannot (no matter how hard he may try to) remember the sign chains he has understood, a consecutive interpreter is able nevertheless to “re-say that which has been said,” “that which has been said” must be different from the signs used to say it. They maintain that between the moment it is understood and 3

On the other hand, a text whose “truth” lies exclusively on its propositional resemblance to the original instructions -say, in order to prove their aptness or ineptness before a court of law- would, indeed, be a translation. © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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the moment it is newly verbalised sense is a de-verbalised mental state. Sense is not, however, an entelechy: its production and comprehension demand the activation of a whole series of cognitive supplements, since it is the simultaneous product of the comprehension of the linguistic signs and of the activation of those relevant cognitive supplements. Some reject the very possibility of a “non verbal” sense. The fact is, nevertheless, that if sense can remain invariable despite the change of its linguistic vehicle, it must have an ontologically independent existence - regardless of the fact that in order to exist it must always adopt a verbal form (but not necessarily the same one each time, whence the possibility of translation). In any event, as Gutt, the Parisians fail to make explicit that a translation may have purposes different from those of the original and, due to their absolute emphasis on sense (which, although they never really define, for all practical purposes they understand as the propositional content that the speaker means to convey) at the well-nigh total disregard of form, they also effectively disregard the contextual effects specially qualitative- of communication. Indeed, it is not the same thing to mean to say than to mean to do by saying, nor, for that matter, to understand than to mean to do by understanding. Mariano García Landa: speech and translation as perceptual processes García Landa (1990, 1995, 1998a and b, and 2001) is the first one to understand that the deverbalised existence of sense is not the explanation of translation but rather that which must be explained. He defines speech as the production of second-degree (i.e. non-natural) percepts whose object is sense - that which a speaker means to say. “…La revolución del descubrimiento del Sentido como la realidad radical de la traducción significa que [la visión de que los hablantes “eligen” las palabras que les convienen para expresar lo que quieren decir], sin ser del todo errónea, no es exacta porque oculta un hecho importante: las “lenguas” o “sistemas de signos” no existen, lo único que existe son los actos de habla concretos y reales. Los significados semánticos no “existen” sino que se crean en cada acto de habla y se crean como el “sentido” concreto y real, existente de veras... El sentido se realiza, se hace real, se pone a existir en los actos de habla reales y concretos... Hemos caído en la trampa de que las lenguas y los significados semánticos son entes reales, que de veras existen en la actualidad, y que son como la cazuelas y sartenes que el cocinero saca del aparador cuando quiere cocinar. Esa visión oculta la realidad que es que las “lenguas” y las significaciones semánticas existen pero solo como normas introyectadas o aprendidas que los hablantes usan casi siempre de manera casi “automática” y a veces de manera deliberada como cuando uno no encuentra la palabra que tiene en la punta de la lengua pero que no llega a materializarse” (2001:326327). [The revolution of the discovery of Sense as the radical reality of translation means that [the idea that speakers “choose” the words they find convenient to express what they wish to say], even though not altogether wrong, is not exact 22

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either since it hides an important fact: “languages” or “sign systems” do not exist - only specific and real acts of speech exist. Semantic meanings do not “exist” but are created in each specific speech act and are created as specific, real, truly existing “sense.” Sense is realised, becomes real, is born unto existence in actual and specific acts of speech. We have fallen into the trap of believing that languages and semantic meanings are real entities, that they actually exist, and that they are like the kettles and pans that a chef takes out of the cupboard when he sets about to cook. This notion hides the reality that “languages” and semantic meanings exist but only as norms introjected or learnt that speakers use almost always almost “automatically” - and sometimes deliberately, as when we cannot find that word that, although we have it on the tip of our tongue, fails to materialise.]

This is the central idea: Outside the specific speech act sense does not exist. Sense is not in the signs, but is the product of a social perception whose vehicle are those signs, which, moreover, are also bereft of material “existence.” What a speaker physically does, as a matter of fact, is produce differences in air pressure or doodlings4 - and this is what an interlocutor perceives through his senses. Except that what a speaker wishes to produce are not differences in air pressure (let alone doodlings), nor is it they that an interlocutor understands. There is a decisive ontological distinction between the perception of the social, intentional object, and that of the acoustic chains (or the graphic representation thereof) which such percept is turned into or whence it derives. “La placa perceptual producida por las percepciones hablísticas, que es inseparable de la contraplaca formal en el momento de su producción, contiene una parte “noética” (contenido proposicional, o sea, ideas que se pueden expresar en forma de proposiciones lógicas aunque uno no lo sienta así necesariamente al comprender), y una parte afectiva, que es el affectus... Todo lo que dicen los hombres está lleno de un “affectus” que sale del alma de la que brota ese decir... Esos dos ingredientes, lo noético y lo afectivo, siempre forman parte de la “placa perceptual”... La idea es que, en el momento en que se produce la “comprensión”, o sea, al final del proceso de percepción hablística, se producen juntos los espacios sénsico y formal... pero esa coexistencia solo dura unos instantes (salvo algunas frases especiales que se nos quedan grabadas en la memoria)... Podemos hablar [metafóricamente] de una placa perceptual rectangular que tiene una base noética sobre la que se levanta el “relieve” afectivo. Ambos elementos son inseparables... durante unos instantes... Este relieve afectivo tiene una graduación que va desde el grado cero hasta la llamada “forma” literaria. En la conversación corriente o en el discurso matemático y científico, el relieve afectivo tiene grado cero porque, aunque existe... no es pertinente y se descuida... En esto no hay diferencia entre los tipos de habla... No se puede hablar... de un [espacio perceptual hablístico intendido] que solo sea el contenido proposicional, y que esté alejado de una “forma” literaria que esté ¿dónde? No en la cadena de signos 4

Or not even that: he can simply press keys that become bytes that will later become points of light on a screen. © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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[del espacio formal], es decir, en cuanto a una “peculiaridad” de la placa de las percepciones hablísticas. Por ello, el afecto no lo produce una determinada “forma”... que fuera anterior a la comprensión que junta un espacio [formal] y un espacio [sénsico]. Naturalmente que esta distinción es solo importante para la ciencia y que en la vida diaria uno puede vivir tan tranquilo pensando que la forma del verso es lo que produce la reacción afectiva (o estética)” (ibíd.:358359). [The perceptual plate produced by speech perceptions, which, at the moment it is produced is inseparable from the formal counterplate, contains a “noetic” part (propositional content, i.e., ideas that can be expressed in the form of logical propositions even though one may not necessarily feel it upon understanding), and an emotive part, which is the affectus. Everything men say is teeming with an “affectus” arising from the soul whence saying comes. These two ingredients, noetic and emotive, always form part of the “perceptual plate,” the idea being that, at the moment “comprehension” takes place, i.e., at the end of the speech perceptual process, sensic and formal spaces are produced together. Such coexistence, however, lasts barely an instant (except for some phrases that cling to our memory). We can speak [metaphorically] of a rectangular perceptual plate with a noetic base upon which stands the emotive “relief.” Both elements are inseparable for an instant. This emotive relief has a gradation ranging from zero to the so-called literary “form.” In everyday conversation or in mathematical and scientific discourse, the emotive relief is zero because, even though it exists, it is not relevant and is disregarded. In this there is no difference between the different sorts of speech. One cannot speak of an intended perceptual space that is limited to propositional content and that is removed from a literary “form” that is, where? Not in the sign chain of the [formal space], i.e. as a “peculiarity” of the speechperception’s plate. Affectus is therefore not produced by a given “form” that is outside comprehension and that joins a formal and a sensic space. Needless to say, this distinction matters only to science: In everyday life one we can live blissfully believing that what produces de emotive (or aesthetic) reaction is the form of a poem.]

The speaker verbalises his intended sense by means of a linguistic chain that must become sensorially perceptible as noise (or visual or tactile images), i.e. that must be turned into a natural, first-degree stimulus producing another natural, first-degree perception. At the other end of the act of communication, the interlocutor projects on the acoustic stimulus he has perceived his knowledge of the sign systems (the sedimentation of the countless acts of speech in which he has participated) and of the world, and associates those differences in air pressure with linguistic signs, so that he too can perceive a linguistic chain. This chain is analysed in a vast mental laboratory in which all the other stimuli accompanying the speech perception proper enter into play together with a complex array of knowledge and experience. The end product of this alchemy is a new speech percept. Communication will have succeeded in so far as the object perceived by the speaker as his meaning meant is the same now perceived by the interlocutor as meaning understood, i.e. insofar as there obtain 24

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between them a relation of identity. Such identity is not to be understood in the mathematical sense but as the relation established, as in natural perception, between a percept and its object. Aware that many criticise the term without having duly understood the concept, García Landa qualifies this by explaining that: “Lo que estoy escribiendo aquí produce en ti, lector, percepciones hablísticas lo suficientemente idénticas a las mías como para poder decir que son idénticas a secas” (2001: 81). [What I am writing here produces in you, reader, speech perceptions that are identical enough to mine so as to allow us to say that they are identical, period.]

Although when explaining his theory, his assertion is much more radical: “La teoría de la traducción consiste en dos gestos teóricos muy sencillos: uno, el modelo del acto de habla que modela lo que pasa al hablar, quedando entendido que se trata de una comunicación y que la comunicación solo existe cuando hay una identidad absoluta entre la percepción cadacualsuya que el primer hablante quería transmitir y la percepción cadacualsuya que su interlocutor produce cuando comprende, y, dos, el modelo del habla traductora, que presenta dos actos de habla, un primer acto de habla en el que un hablante produce una serie de percepciones hablísticas manipulando signos de un sistema de signos, y un segundo acto de habla en que un hablante, llamado intérprete... o traductor..., produce la misma serie de las mismas percepciones hablísticas manipulando signos de otro sistema de signos, quedando entendido que se trata de una comunicación y que la comunicación solo existe cuando hay una identidad absoluta entre la percepción que el primer hablante quería transmitir y la percepción el intérprete/traductor ha producido y la percepción que el interlocutor del intérprete/traductor produce cuando comprende” (ibíd.:98) [The theory of translation consists in two very simple theoretical moves: One, the model of the speech act, which models what happens as we talk - it being understood that we are dealing with a communication and that communication exists only when there is absolute identity between the one-of-a-kind perception that the first speaker wished to convey an the one-of-a-kind perception produced by his interlocutor upon understanding. Two, the model of translational speech, which presents two speech acts, a first one in which a speaker produces a series of speech perceptions by manipulating signs of a sign system, and a second one in which a speaker, called interpreter or translator, produces the same series of the same speech perceptions by manipulating signs of another system - it being understood that we are dealing with a communication, and that communication exists only when there obtains absolute identity between what the first speaker wished to convey and the perception produced by the interpreter/translator as he understands.]

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It must be stressed that the interlocutor does not directly perceive a linguistic chain. The linguistic chain comes to him, as it were, “from within,” as he applies to those noises his own “speech interpretation rules.” Whenever, for whatever reasons, this application becomes impossible, all that we can perceive is the “noise” of speech. The second crucial fact is that comprehension of the linguistic chain does not automatically entail comprehension of noetic content: we can understand someone’s words without quite grasping what he means to say by them. The third fact is that noetic content can be comprehended despite a defective perception of the linguistic signs. The fourth and decisive one is that most of the time, noetic content is comprehended automatically, without any awareness of the linguistic chain that serves as its vehicle. These four facts prove the ontological independence of sense with respect to linguistic form. García Landa compares meaning meant to the light reflected by an object (in this instance, meaning meant or intended sense) through a window pane (in our case, a linguistic one). If the glass is too murky, perception becomes difficult or even impossible. As with the dirty glass pane, the linguistic chain cannot be consciously perceived except when it stands on the way of sense comprehension (when it calls attention to itself). In the overwhelming mayoría de los casos, however, on n’est même pas conscient della lingua dass wir sprechen or is spoken to us, and we blithely glean over all manners of tipographical or even semantic mistakes. The segmentation of the process of linguistic articulation into phonation, sound perception, phonic and phonemic reconstruction, morphosyntactic organisation and realisation of the semantic potential is, of course, artificial: In everyday speech we exchange meanings without any awareness of anything in between. García Landa’s experiments with simultaneous interpreters lead him to posit that speech percepts are produced as a rule roughly every 250 milliseconds (1998:28-32, and 2001:402-405); they are the “units of sense” that serve as a basis for speech production and comprehension. The aim of a speaker, however, is to produce thereby a speech perceptual space - i.e. a complex series of percepts, that would be, in turn, the actual object of comprehension. The distinction, however, is not clearly conceptualised: His model of the act of speech applies both to the production and comprehension of each individual percept every 250 milliseconds or so, and to any perceptual space, from the simplest to the most complex. Also, the model does not include either the paralinguistic or the kinetic configuration, i.e. the way a speaker “says” what he says (unless they are considered part of the situation - but I find it a bit too farfetched). This poses a further problem - that of the “emotive” relief: How are emotions “transmitted” via speech unless they are explicated propositionally?

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García Landa’s models García Landa’s theory is captured in his model of the speech act. The act of speech is a social transaction5 that is initiated when the speaker perceives his own intention to say and it ends when the interlocutor has perceived it. In other words, speech begins and ends in the heads of a specific speaker and interlocutor. Every speech act takes place in a specific situation governed by a virtual “exponential” field made up of the parties’ knowledge, experience and social practices. Sense “appears” in the minds of the parties to a speech act as a series of speech percepts which is invariably produced in a specific situation (an idea parallel to Lvovskaya’s) outside which it does not exist. As with natural perception, sense as the outcome of social perception consists each time in the identity of the percept and its cause (of comprehension and the object of comprehension). This “one-of-a-kindness” is crucial: Outside the specific speech act sense does not exist - it only is born unto existence when it is perceived - and it is perceived each time in a different situation. García Landa presents his models using a notation that greatly simplifies discussion but has up to the present terrified his readers who think that this is some kind of mathematical mumbo jumbo, whereas, in fact, it is but a shorthand device (surprisingly, nobody seems to bear a similar grudge against Reiss and Vermeer, whose notation is way more complex!). García Landa starts by modelling monolingual communication. Let the reader not be daunted by the symbolic notation: Do: LPIKo→ Fo(XmL,SmH,VmR)GPMoVHtm ↔ LPCKo

Which reads as follows: 1) There is a (successful) speech act D in language o, whereby the subject of production wants to produce a speech percept LPI6 that is an actualisation of a given knowledge base K; 2) To that effect he sets in motion a complex mental operation which consists mainly of constructing and presenting (→) to his interlocutor(s) a finished social product which is a linguistic sign chain F in language o (made perceptible through a phonomorphosyntactic structure X - which is the actualisation of the corresponding system L, and is endowed with a semantic 5

Which is also the way Hatim and Mason see it: All texts are seen as evidence of a communicative transaction taking place within a social framework” (1990:2). 6

In actual fact, the symbols he uses are EPHi and EPHc, the Spanish acronyms for espacio perceptual hablístico intendido and espacio perceptual hablístico comprendido (speech perceptual space intended/comprehended), but in the English versions (García Landa 1990, 1995, and 1998a and b) he uses LPI and LPC (acronyms of “linguistic percept intended/comprehended”). I think that changing the symbols according to the specific language defeats the purpose, so I am taking the liberty of using here the shorter ones, which I will also use in my own development of the model. © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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potential S - as the actualisation of the system H, and a rhythmic/prosodic structure V of the system R) with all the components characterised by specific sets of features m, n, etc.; 3) This chain is produced in a given social situation (or sociohistorical field) G governed by a system of beliefs, implicit and explicit social norms and practices or a certain life and personal experience P within a given microworld M and at a historic moment VH, and, within it, at a specific time t (characterised, as all the other components, by an individual, specific, ad hoc set of features m, which in the case of t means a specific moment); 4) The subject of comprehension (interlocutor, addressee, eavesdropper, or any other subject of comprehension, who could be the same person playing both roles, i.e. communicating with himself), is listening and understanding in a complex mental operation -whereby he applies retroactively (↔) his own relevant knowledge to interpret the acoustic stimulus- which results in his “seeing” something, namely in producing in turn a speech percept, an LPCo (which, if communication is to succeed, must be an actualisation of the same knowledge base K). Identity is thus postulated between what the speaker means to say and what the interlocutor comprehends, otherwise there would be no communication. Communication will therefore have succeeded if: (LPIo = LPCo) GoPMVHtm Which reads as follows: Meaning as intended and as comprehended as a function of shared knowledge, and verbalised and perceived in a given language are identical in a specific situation governed by shared norms, experiences and beliefs, both general and speech act-specific. On the basis of this model of communication García Landa gives his disarmingly simple definition of translation: translating is talking in order to resay in a second language that which has been said in the original language - a language game whose object is to isolate and reproduce in another language “meanings meant” by speakers. The translator becomes a vicarious addressee; he understands, as it were, on the intended addressee’s behalf, and then becomes the speaker, speaking, again as it were, on the original speaker’s behalf, producing his own LPI and gauging all the new factors relevant for its verbalisation in a new chain of linguistic signs: Fi(XnL,SnH,VnR), which may entail a myriad formal modifications at the less relevant levels. Thus the model of translation would be the reproduction of an LPI in a new act of speech in a second language i, which is never a simple mirror-replication of the original one:

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LPIoK  Fo(XmL,SmH,VmR)GPMVHtm  LPCoK  ---------------------------Do------------------------

 LPIiK  Fi(XnL,SnH,VnR)GPMVHtm+n  LPCiK --------------------------Di---------------------------

Where, let me remind you, the sub-indexes m and n stand for the individual, specific, ad hoc features of the respective general components X, S, V and VHt. Yet the result is the same: (LPIo = LPCi) GiPMVHtm+n

The basic limitation of the previous approaches, as García Landa rightly asserts, is that they are not grounded in an apt theory of speech. Things begin to take definite shape only once we start in the mind of the speaker and end in that of the interlocutor: Those are the shores that the speech bridge spans – sense is a percept whose object is the other person’s meaning meant and, translatologically speaking, any kind of equivalence will be such insofar as it allows for a certain equivalence or sameness or identity between meaning as meant by the speaker and as perceived by his interlocutor. The process, of course, does not end there far from it!- but there it begins. If we do not start from there, our first step is out of and into the vacuum and later on it becomes very hard to keep our way and our balance. There is, moreover, a decisive factor that contributes to clearing the confusion about the different “meanings” produced around communication and generated by it. Hay que distinguir siempre el hecho de la comprensión, cuando se produce la placa perceptual [espacio sénsico-formal], y las consecuencias “psicológicas” posteriores. La percepción hablística se produce en una relación social entre agentes sociales en un punto determinado del espacio-tiempo históricos. Es el resultado de una comunicación que, utilizando un sistema de signos en una transacción social, permite transmitir informaciones (lo noético) y emociones (lo afectivo) pero la percepción hablística resultante no contiene nada de “pragmático” porque esto está en las intenciones o bien en los efectos, ambos ulteriores, de los hablantes pero nunca en el espacio [formal] y por ello nunca en el espacio [sénsico]. El comprendedor, una vez percibido lo que el otro quiere decir, tiene una “placa perceptual”, lo que permite, junto con el conocimiento de la situación... (que incluye la historia pasada), inferir intencionalidades del otro pero estas intencionalidades no están nunca en la placa de la percepción, son una reflexión posterior, aunque se trate de cien milisegundos más tarde... Normalmente las intenciones pragmáticas se ocultan o disimulan. Si están en [el espacio sénsico-formal], hay que traducirlas. Si no están en ese espacio, es decir, si no se verbalizan, no pueden estar en la percepción sino en lo que pasa después de la percepción, cuando pensamos sobre lo que acabamos de comprender... y no se pueden ni se deben traducir” (ibid.:360-361).

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[We must always distinguish the fact of comprehension, that which happens as the perceptual plate [sensic-formal space] is produced, from the subsequent “psychological” consequences. Speech perception is generated in a social relationship between social agents at a specific point of historic time-space. It is the outcome of a communication that, by means of a sign system used in a social transaction, makes it possible to convey information (the noetic) and emotions (the emotive), but the resulting speech perception has nothing “pragmatic” about it. The pragmatic is either in the parties’ intentions or in the effects felt by them, both subsequent, but never in the [formal] space and therefore never in the [sensic] space. The comprehender, once he has perceived what the speaker wishes to say, ends up with a “perceptual plate,” which, together with his knowledge of the situation (which includes past history), allows him to infer the speaker’s intentionality. Such intentionality, however, is never in the perceptual plate, it is a subsequent reflection, even if it occurs but one hundred milliseconds later. Normally pragmatic intentions are hidden or disguised. If they are in the [sensic-formal space] they must be translated. If they are not -if they are not verbalised- they cannot be part of the perception but of what happens after the perception, when we think about what we have just understood, and cannot and should not be translated.]

The distinction is very much on target. If we separate what has been said as propositional content a) from the intention behind it, and b) from the effects produced by its comprehension, we have isolated the core of translatability: To translate is to speak in order to re-say what has been said - regardless of whether such re-saying makes it possible to infer such or such an intention and/or produces or fails to produce such effects in a specific situation, The problem, of course, lies in stopping here. Bruno Osimo: translation as a semiotic activity This book was basically finished when I chanced upon Osimo’s (2001 and 2002) work. He is not, then, a “precursor” of this theory, but his vision has helped me give better shape to several key aspects, especially with respect to literary translation. Since his thoughts have been published only in Italian, I think that a more detailed exegesis is in order. As García Landa, Osimo looks at the phenomenon from the general perspective of translation as communication. But instead of focusing on speech production and comprehension, he approaches communication as a Peircean semiotic process7. For Osimo, communication and translation are a semiotic process that starts and ends in “mental” texts. The idea has many contact points with García Landa’s, but does not quite coincide with it. The reason is that Osimo allows himself to be blinded by written speech. Writing, he states, consists in transposing a mental text into a written text. The mental material is “multimedia” and is composed of feelings, emotions, memories and a code

7

The three authors I know of to have explicitly incorporated Peirce’s model into translation theory are Gorlée (1989, 1994, 1997 and 1998), Eco (2001), and Osimo (2001). 30

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partly produced by several perceptual organs: visual images, smells, flavours, tactile sensations and sounds. The fact that the relationship between sign and object is mediated by a psychic representation, by an affectus (in the psychoanalytical sense), turns semiosis into a subjective fact. Our thought or inner language is made of interpretants8 or mental signs. That is why each time we want to express our thought we must translate our interpretants into verbal signs (Osimo thus echoes the notion of “deverbalisation” referred to by Seleskovitch and Lederer). Our mediating ability stems form our awareness of our interpretants’ subjectivity and to the fact that, in order to communicate, we are bound to resort, by approximation, to signs that have, for our interlocutors, good chances to refer to objects at least similar to those that, while communicating, we allude to in our mind (a position similar to Lvovskaya’s). Since in natural languages there is no bi-univocal correspondence between sign and object, if I wish to express the same concept at two different moments, I resort to different signs, producing in my interlocutors different effects. When two interlocutors exchange signs, each of them, by means of his own interpretants, refers to inner objects, to mental signs that are totally or partially different, wherein lies the communicative “remainder,”9 which is, by definition, ineffable. A sign, for its part, only becomes a sign if it is interpreted as such. Every act of perception, including reading, is an act of interpretation. The reader is not sure of what he thinks he has understood as he reads: His are only conjectures, which become constantly confirmed or unconfirmed or belied during the reading process. Thus, the semiosis of a text is unlimited. The translator occupies a fundamental place in the hermeneutic circle, since, as a critic, he has the responsibility and the duty to understand in depth a text’s strategies. Interlingual translation modifies a text’s signs substituting them by other signs. Forced to choose a single “translatant,” the translator alters the semantic aspect of the sign he presents to the reader in his metatext. The reader of the translated text is thus presented with an interpretive space perhaps as vast, but different. Translation is a process leading from the “prototext” in the source language to the “metatext” in the target language. “Prototext” and “metatext” are more than the original and the translated texts proper, since they incorporate the paratextual apparatus. The end of the process is a “mental text” in the mind of the interlocutor. The science of translation, adds Osimo, is the discipline that studies the translational process as it unfolds, but as an empirical and descriptive science it must also have the instruments to study the finished process. Translation criticism is, therefore, one of its components. Translation criticism has many peculiarities, above all that its object is not a text but at least two: prototext and metatext. 8

In this case, interpretants are interpretations of verbal signs. Metarepresentations would be, then, second-degree interpretants. 9

A notion also developed by Venuti 1995. © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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To my mind, the problem is that Osimo refers to signs as simply anything that can be known -in the Peircean sense- whilst speech signs are, in fact, the manifestations of a human communicative intention inaccessible to direct perception. Despite García Landa’s caveat, Osimo treats them as if they had an independent existence. Translation is no longer a process of communication between two flesh-and-blood people and becomes a lonely Ping-Pong between an immutable, motionless, intentionality-bereft sign (the “strategy” is not that of the speaker but of the text), and a dynamic subject. It is the trap in which fall all those who forget that writing is but frozen speech. What difference is there between musing and proceeding to infinite semiosis on the basis of reading a text or of watching the clouds in the sky? When we have a speech perception we perceive (or think that we perceive) that which the other person is trying to say, and, at the same time, we have a direct or indirect awareness that that which we perceive comes from that flesh-and-blood human being who is speaking to us. This is the great difference between natural and social perception: clouds do not show themselves, nor do they show us the faces that we think we can see in them, clouds are not meant for us to see. Communicative intentions, on their part, are, precisely, both communicative and intentional, they are meant to be perceived, they are specifically addressed, calculated, forged and materialised with perception (and response) in mind - in the mind of the social being who is their subject: They are the product of an intention coupled with a pragmatic, hermeneutic and rhetorical strategy. Osimo thus “mingles” what pertains to speech with everything else. It is obviously true that as we speak we have all those other things in our minds as well - but we have them also when we are not speaking. I therefore find his definition of “text” too general, especially when it comes to translation. To my mind, it is methodologically more productive to limit ourselves to whatever is speech-specific, since to translate is to speak, and to speak, as García Landa has shown us, is to produce speech perceptions. All these things that come to our minds or happen to us (and of which sometimes we are not even aware) concomitantly can only be understood if they are turned into external signs, and can only be, as it were, “explicated” if they are exteriorised by means of linguistic signs capable of inducing semantic representations. Comprehension will have succeeded insofar as what you understand (on the basis of the perception and comprehension of my linguistic signs) that I wish to say to you is the same that I meant you to understand - regardless of losses and ineffable remainders (i.e. of what I do not manage to say). As the main tool of speech is semantic representation, the only sameness that we can rely upon without much suspicion is propositional content (and not even referential -let alone emotiveone, since it is not enough for you to know the meaning of the word “camel” as I am activating it in this specific utterance, or to perceive the concept “camel” that I mentally activate, in order to know what is a camel or to understand all the emotive reverberations that its activation has triggered in me in this instant).

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Things become much more clear, I believe, if we take as our basis García Landa’s model of speech production and comprehension and then proceed to analyse what of all that is to be found in a speaker’s mind makes its way into the “funnel” of speech communication and how, and what and how comes out at the other end and spreads over the interlocutor’s mind to mingle with what is, as it were, already there waiting for it. Osimo does not succeed at letting go off the written, motionless, immutable sign that is understood again and again. As it turns out, such sign is, for starters, a recent invention (unlike speech, which is the product of bio-social evolution), which, statistically speaking, moreover, is not that all too widespread: the vast majority of human beings that are (including, of course, children) -let alone those who have been over the last 100,000 years- cannot read. It is dangerous to depart too much from orality. Yet, if we do not lose sight of this all-important source of all other modes of speech, Osimo’s ideas become particularly relevant, especially when it comes to translating literature (which is, obviously, what interests him most). Another problem, in my view, is that Osimo sees human beings as isolated subjectivities, each teeming with all manner of mental signs, which they at times decide to communicate without ever quite managing. García Landa, instead, sees them steeped in the social magma. It is social life that makes speech acquisition possible, with it, the very existence of all the other mental signs making up human conscience as the interiorisation of the subject’s social praxis. In this social magma, human beings cannot stop communicating, and they do so by producing speech perceptions, which, in the -never all too distantend are identical enough often enough for us to “understand each other” - to enable collective intentionality and, with it, the survival of the species and the development of the productive forces of society. Remainders trapped in the minds of the engineers who designed the space shuttle, or of the workers who put it together, or of the politicians who approved the project, are of little or no consequence. Nor are the effects they may have felt at each moment - unless, of course, such effects have led them to modify their socially relevant acts. These criticisms aside, Osimo says several things that I find crucial. The most important one, perhaps, is that communication begins with a “mental text” and ends in another “mental text.” Indeed! Except that these “mental texts” are respectively prior and subsequent to speech production and comprehension and can only be accessed from our awareness as a linear series of speech percepts in as many acts of inner speech. This means that, in turn, they can only be accessed if they are reduced to propositional form under the guise of semantic representations: The important thing, when it comes to speaking and, a fortiori, translating, is the relationship that, by means of the production of such percepts, obtains between those two “mental texts.” These “mental texts” will be, by definition, both similar and different, since each will combine each time a whole gamut of feelings, memories, impressions, and emotions specific to the subject at that specific time. Nevertheless, in order for communication and translation to © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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succeed (for them to be possible at all!), these “mental texts” must have something in common. Something of what was in the mind of the speaker must “cross over” to the mind of the interlocutor more or less intact, and that is nothing more -or less!- than what a speaker verbalises in the specific situation: In principle, speech communication and translation are equally possible and impossible, perfect and defective. Archimedes’ principle does not change every time it is verbalised or understood - much as the effects of its comprehension may vary each time. As the rest of the “pre-Landians,” Osimo fails to establish an ontological and methodological distinction between speech production and comprehension proper and the production and comprehension of all other kinds of Peircean “signs,” whether inner or outer, externalisable or not. His concept, though stupendously comprehensive, fails in the end to zero in closely on the process of speech, and, therefore, of translation. To translate is, indeed, to speak in order to re-say what has been said in another language - but this is not enough And to re-say what has been said is, after all, to manage to have an interlocutor understand the same noetic content as meant by a speaker. Except that translators seldom limit themselves to such thing. There is a gap between translation as a theoretical construct and what translators actually do. This book shall attempt to bridge it. The basic problem with the different theoretical approaches before what I call the Landan revolution, as we have seen, is that they are not grounded in a theory of speech. What is missing is a theory of speech production and comprehension as a perceptual process setting in motion all the subsequent pragmatic and cognitive processes. With it, also missing is a satisfactory definition of sense and/or meaning. And with it, a definition of translation that is both theoretically and practically apt. If we limit ourselves to looking at translation as a relationship between texts, or as a text-production and comprehension activity (which it is also), we are leaving out both main pillars supporting speech communication: The minds of the parties to the act of communication and, more specifically, the historically and situationally conditioned intention to do by saying and the historically and situationally conditioned intention to do by understanding that gives rise to it in the first place. Reiss, Vermeer, Nord, Holz-Mänttäri and other functionalists, though without disregarding them, fail to incorporate explicitly these two extremes that precede and follow speech production and comprehension. This, I think, prevents them from producing a definition that is at the same time sufficiently precise and general. As they stand, functionalist approaches show themselves incapable of distinguishing translation from all other forms of interlingual mediation. This is, I believe, their theoretical Achilles’ heel. To sum up, then, the approaches by Nida, Gutt, Lvovskaya, the Parisians and García Landa (to translate is to reproduce sense/propositional content) are too restrictive, while that of Reiss and Vermeer (to translate is to offer an information offer about 34

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another information offer) - too wide, and Osimo’s (to translate is to produce a “mental metatext” out of a “mental prototext”) too vague to define with sufficient generality and precision not so much what is to translate, but what translators are called upon to do as professional interlingual mediators.

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CHAPTER I SPEECH, COMMUNICATION, TRANSLATION AND MEDIATION “In a context of translation, preservation of the experiential meaning is neither a necessary, nor a sufficient condition for a translation to be uniquely classified as “good” or “bad, ” at least for many text types... The question of preservation of meaning is factored into a series of dimensions (field, tenor, mode, and their sub-attributes), any combination of which can be foregrounded, dependent on the text type, purpose of translation, etc.” (Steiner “Register-Based Translation Evaluation: An Advertisement as a Case in Point,” Target 10:2, 1998:314).

Why I think it advisable to develop García Landa’s model Even though my summary of García Landa’s theory is obviously too succinct to do it justice, the essential points, I think, are clearly apparent. For me, as I hinted, the revolutionary Landan concept of speech comprehension and production as perceptual process, even though providing a solid foundation for a theory of language and translation, is not sufficient to explain what professional translators and interpreters are called upon to do besides translating. My fundamental contention is that LPI/LPC identity (the identity of a speech percept and its cause or between two speech percepts sharing a common cause1) is not the end of the hermeneutic story but, rather, the beginning2. What

1

A moot question that both García Landa and I are trying to resolve. If, as I tend to think at present, meaning meant comes to the speaker’s awareness as a perception (for instance, if Jackendoff’s (1996a and b) Intermediate Level Theory of Consciousness is right - even though I disagree with many of his assumptions), then an LPI is the object, or cause, of it and it is perceived by the speaker himself as an LPC (the first and often only percept of his LPI, which need not be made manifest externally for an interlocutor to perceive in turn). In this case, the interlocutor’s LPC would be a second percept of the same LPI. Insofar as I have managed adequately to verbalise my LPI, both you and I end up with our respective percepts of it -your LPC and my own LPC- which, by definition, must be both identical to it. Now, the million-rouble question is, are those two percepts identical to each other? Since they are the product of the same social perceptual apparatus common to the species (as represented by the social group), they are certainly derived by applying the same rules of interpretation (as happens with natural perceptions). Still, is your percept of my LPI identical to my own percept of it? Fortunately, I think my theory and model can survive either answer. 2

Osimo states it impeccably:

“La prima fase [del processo di comprensione è] inconsapevole, automatica [ed] in certi tipi di comunicazione è anche l’unica (si pensi alla lettura superficiale), mentre che per la traduzione... professionale è solo l’inizio” (2001:27). © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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interests me is not so much the micro level of spontaneous, linear, bottom-up production of a speech percept, but rather the postperceptual macro level of the further top-down processing of those LPCs that constitute our speech perceptual input. For starters, in order practically to understand my speech, you do not need to understand every single LPI that I am trying to verbalise. You can make do by perceiving enough of the LPIs that make up my intended perceptual space to say that, for all practical purposes -yours alone, mine alone, or ours combined- you have understood what I meant you to understand - i.e. you have understood me relevantly3. At the postperceptual level, comprehension is, both quantitatively and qualitatively, a matter of degree. It all depends on how much you have understood spontaneously, and how relevant is that which you have understood or failed to understand. Perception and metarepresentation When I speak now about what you have understood or not, I am referring to your metarepresentation4 of what I intended you to understand globally and at different levels - for instance, this explanation of my concept5. You may understand it without having understood each and every LPI so far (upon reading this book for a second time, for instance, you would only pay attention to key passages), or you may fail to understand it even if, so far, you have managed to understand each and every LPI6. This difference in quantitative and qualitative degrees of bottom-up comprehension in the end is decisive when it comes to metarepresenting topdown the speaker’s global communicative and metacommunicative intentions. If [The first phase of the comprehension process is unconscious, automatic, and in certain types of communication it is also the only one (think of superficial reading), whilst for professional translation it is but the beginning.] 3

Osimo (2001 and 2002) refers to a text’s dominant (and constellation of subdominants): the component around which a text is focussed and which ensures its integrity. The dominant may be, for instance, ideological, aesthetic, informative, etc. In this specific act of reading, the dominant in this text of mine may be different for you from what it was for me as I wrote it (the way Rushdie’ s Satanic Verses most unexpectedly acquired a religious dominant for many of its Muslim readers - and, most pointedly, non-readers). Relevant comprehension could almost be defined as ideational comprehension sub specie dominantis. 4

See also Noh (2000) and Sperber (2002). In Peircean terms, this metarepresentation would be a new interpretant, no longer of F but of the LPC itself. It must be noted that metarepresentations also come to our awareness as speech perceptual spaces, articulated by means of acts of inner speech as series of LPIs. 5

A very similar approach is advocated by Malmkjaer (2000) and, especially, by Osimo (2001). 6

There is also a socially relevant difference between a) not understanding and being aware that we have not understood or made ourselves understood, and b) outright misunderstanding. Misunderstandings, as we know, are much more difficult to detect and correct than obvious failures at comprehension. 38

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at the micro level, due to the linearity of speech, comprehension is also linear (though more discretely segmented), at the postperceptual level, comprehension entails a thorough reorganisation and sistematisation of those linearly produced LPCs: We constantly enrich and revise our global representation of what that series of LPCs -presumably, but not always necessarily identical to the respective LPIs- amount to as meaning globally meant on the part of our interlocutor. Cognitively, it seems quite clear: If F seldom makes it past shortterm memory, an LPI seldom makes it past medium-term memory; only metarepresentations are stored in long-term memory (this, as we shall see, is a crucial hurdle in simultaneous interpretation). These metarepresentations, needless to say, can only be activated via inner speech by means of a new series of LPs - except that these LPs are no longer a product of the original speaker’s utterance, they are no longer produced in the subject by someone “external to the perceptual system” whose intentionality has to be inferred: Their origin is in the metarepresentations stored in the subject’s long-term memory, which is necessarily imperfect and can be biased. At the macro level, I insist, noetic “sameness” of (meta-)representations is not to be confused with the identity of speech percepts. This sameness of representations of meaning as globally, rather than locally, meant- is, let me repeat, a matter of degree. Indeed, since the number and combinations of specific LPIs that are understood can vary from one interlocutor to another (or for a single interlocutor at different times), and since the further processing of sense comprehended as a consequence of perceiving a sequence of LPIs is carried out by an extremely complex machinery of cognitive and emotive factors, at the postperceptual level interlocutors necessarily end up with subtly or widely different metarepresentations. This is pilfering García Landa’s term but not quite his concept- the relativity of meaning (or, as some prefer, its “instability”7): not that today I perceive A and tomorrow B, but that the same sequence of speech percepts leads me to metarepresent A to-day and B tomorrow, or me to metarepresent A and you to metarepresent B8 (pretty much as in natural perception the same object may be interpreted by an archaeologist as a mere stone and by another as a man-made artefact). This does not normally stand in the way of assuming that we are talking about the same object, say, the same theory of interlingual mediation, even if we have each interpreted it our own way. In other words, we have two different layers of ideational comprehension: the one that is the object of the speech perception, and a more complex one that is the product of a (series of) metarepresentation(s) based upon it.

7

For instance Chesterman and Arrojo (2000) and many of the others who contributed to the Forum discussion in Target 2000:1 and the following issues, notably Simeoni (2000). 8

Which explains, as we shall see, that Cervantes’s Quijote and that by Borges’s Pierre Menard “read” alike but are understood differently. © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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This distinction, I submit, allows both for the first-level identity that García Landa postulates as necessary for speech comprehension and for the second-level non-identity posited by Lvovskaya, Osimo and others, such as Peeters, who, arguing against Jackendoff (1996), states: “I... had to guess what Jackendoff meant, and readers of my comments will have to guess what I have in mind... Some elements may be lost, others gained, others still transposed. It would be rash to conclude that the original and the reconstructed meaning are identical, and it would be equally rash to conclude that there is no relationship at all” (1996:147).

The corollary is that, according to our particular purpose at a given time, our perception of an object, even a social one such as meaning, even if undistorted, may not be the relevant one. There is a qualitative leap, moreover, between understanding the ideational meaning that people wish to convey and understanding people - not only what they mean to say, but also what they mean to hide, why, etc. This third-degree comprehension, of course, goes far beyond speech comprehension proper. I am not denying the possibility of spontaneous, first-level LPI/LPC identity: Without it how could we even hope eventually to understand anything that is said to us. What I find problematic, rather, is the “identity” of global metarepresentations a) of that which a speaker means to say to us and b) of what he means to achieve by saying it9. The relativity of meaning, let me repeat, is always postperceptual and metacommunicative. What is relative, in other words, is meaning metarepresented on the basis of a propositionally complex series of LPCs: It is metarepresented meaning that leaves the mnesic trace, in Seleskovitch’s felicitous expression, since it alone can give rise to further, more complex metarepresentations through propositional enrichment (see, for instance, Katan 1999). As a case in point, when Rickert states that: “When you speak, and I listen, I do not record a verbatim reproduction of your speech in my brain. I interpret it, and my memory will be of my interpretation” (quoted by Peeters 1996:149).

I take him to be referring not to spontaneous comprehension, but to a metarepresentation of meaning based on an initially spontaneous comprehension - and this, in itself, is my own metarepresentation. This is the difference between the elementary act of speech whereby a unit of sense is produced, and the complex sequence of such “mini-” acts whereby a whole perceptual space is created. I have been tempted to call the latter a “communication act” as opposed 9

We can readily see the advantage of mathetic notation. I can change the definition without changing the sign: LPI/LPC still are a speaker’s meaning meang and his interlocutor’s meaning as comprehended, whilst = continues to represent the relationship that must obtain in order for one to have understood or have made himself understood by the other. 40

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to a speech act, but I do not think it is worth the practical results. I will therefore stick to García Landa’s terminology and use both “speech act” and “LPI” respectively to mean the act whereby a propositionally complex perceptual space is produced and the resulting complex metarepresentation(s), and identity to the sameness of noetic, propositional or ideational meaning intended and comprehended. Our memories of past speech acts, may I stress, are almost entirely reduced to metarepresented ideational content (we remember more or less relevantly what the poets have said, but not how they said it - nor in all its ideational richness10) which, upon being evoked as a new series of speech percepts in further acts of (more often than not inner) speech, give rise to new metarepresentations. There is also the fact that, through a subsequent process on the basis of speech comprehension, a keener interlocutor may well metarepresent what a speaker means better than another or than the speaker himself. It happens all the time; in some situations some people are more adept at understanding their interlocutors than the latter themselves - it is systematically the case between grownups and young children. Indeed, mediators should have such skills as a crucial part of their professional wherewithal. Again, if what I want to say to you and your comprehension of it do not totally overlap (if there are blanks in comprehension, as there tend to be in a normal telephone conversation), what really counts is that they both coincide in whatever aspects or features are mutually or even individually relevant - i.e. that they are identical enough: Enough for the metacommunicative purposes in hand, for the specific social stakes; after all, what matters is not sheer ideational identity, but what the interlocutors have achieved by means of such identity, however partial or imperfect. The unconscious Another decisive metacommunicative question is whence come the objects of our communicative intention - the meanings we intend an interlocutor to perceive. I suggest that they come whence the meanings come that we intend to communicate to ourselves when engaged in inner speech. They may, of course, eventually be traceable to the constant flux of communication that is the flesh and blood of social life and its individual realisation as our minds. But how is it that, all of a sudden, mostly for no reason at all, they gleam glaringly or dimly fickle into our awareness? There can be little doubt, I think, that meaning meant proceeds to our conscience from its anteroom - even if it only acquires its “final”

10

And although we can remember that we were affected in a specific way, we cannot reexperience the effect unless we perceive anew (via an external stimulus or by evocation, which, I think, bears out my contention that an LPI may indeed be a also perception for the speaker himself). © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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shape as we try to verbalise it for ourselves or publicly11. This is as far down into my own self as I can dig. Here is where my development of García Landa’s model starts: in the unconscious motivation ultimately governing my speech (and other) behaviour as a speaker - and here is also where it ends: in the qualitative effects that comprehension has upon me as an interlocutor, which, again, are governed by and vanish into that which is no longer my consciousness. The contextual effects of comprehension As a speaker, it is not enough for me that you, my interlocutor, understand every bit of the ideational content I am verbalising - what counts is that you understand it (it, not something similar or equivalent or analogous to it) in a certain way, that comprehension of what I mean you to understand produces certain effects and, most especially, that it does not produce certain others. As Bakhtin so insightfully puts it: “An utterance is linked not only to those preceding it, but also to those that will succeed it in the chain of verbal exchange. An utterance, from its very inception, is developed according to the possible reaction-response. The others, those for which my thought becomes, for the first time, real thought (and, because if this, real for me myself12) are not passive listeners, but active participants in the verbal exchange. From the very start the speaker expects from them a response - an active responsive comprehension. The utterance as a whole is articulated as if in anticipation of this response” (1979:302-303, my re-translation from French).

As I verbalise this series of LPIs as they come into my awareness, I do so striving to convince you, trying at the same time not be boring or not to make you work more than you have to. And I do hope that, even if I cannot convince you, at least you will cast a benign eye on my point, suspend disbelief and be willing to entertain it as yours for a while before passing final judgement on it i.e. before you decide what to do with what you have understood. All this is drenched in emotion. This fact is very much relevant to me as a speaker, and I am sure that whether you are or not convinced, and entertained, irritated or bored in the process, is equally relevant to you as an interlocutor. There is, moreover, another important aspect to comprehension at this postperceptual level. In written -or, rather, “recorded”- speech the formal space acquires its own fully fledged ontological status: it can be looked at, dissected, manipulated (if always as the formal space of an ideational space, itself tinged with emotion). Its perception, even if itself a product of ideational perception, 11

See, in this respect, the excellent debate around Jackendoff (1996a) and Chafe (1996a) in Pragmatics & Cognition 4:1 (1996), most particularly Ellis’s contribution. 12

Notice the remarkable coincidence between Bakhtin and García Landa; see also Dufva and Lähteenmäki (1996). 42

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does funny things to us. It is no longer apt to compare it to the invisible windowpane that makes natural perception possible. We can “see” the invisible glass, we can even fool ourselves into believing that the light passing through it comes from nowhere and goes nowhere (which is what formalism does). What counts, in my concept, is the way those funny things that the perception of a formal space, including its paralinguistic and kinetic configuration, relevantly affects our relationship with and attitude towards the ideational meaning comprehended and towards each other. Because that is, in the end, the paramount concern of any flesh-and-blood human being, whether translating or not: what it feels like, not what it actually is or the way it is perceived - much as what it feels like is ultimately determined by what actually is and the way it is perceived. There is more to meaning than ideational content The fact that ideational content can be reverbalised without much ado is essential for translation. Indeed, the translation of pragmatic texts is mostly a matter of reproducing ideational content. This is what Reiss and Vermeer (1991) imply when they speak of a text as an information offer. And that is why it is almost universally recognised that they are “easier” to translate than literary texts, especially than the most formally marked specimens of lyric poetry, in which ideational content may lose most of its relevance. The problem is that there are many other layers of meaning that travel between speaker and interlocutor, even though they are not part of the speech perception proper and ensue from ideational comprehension. One of them is, perhaps, the ideational plate’s emotive relief. If this is so, then in order to be perceived as a component of an LPI it requires being “transposed” into propositional form and/or the attributes of Fo (collocations, register, prosody, etc. - which, being, by definition, formal attributes are at best imitable, but never “translatable”). In any event, all these non-ideational aspects of meaning are, indeed, outside speech production and comprehension per se and are certainly much more difficult to conceptualise, but they cannot simply be brushed aside. Not in human communication in general, and, definitely, not in interlingual mediation. Furthermore, a model of communication through speech cannot ignore the metarepresentation of what might have been said instead of what has been actually uttered: The fact that a wife says to her husband ‘I’m fond of you’ rather than ‘I love you’ may be heavily loaded (and certainly no less the fact that she does not say anything at all). And equally loaded may be the fact that at an international gathering a Spanish delegate of Catalan origin intervenes in French rather than Spanish. Lexical and other positive choices become relevant, in other words, only insofar as an interlocutor can metarepresent the alternatives and the significance of the fact that they have not been chosen or, even, that they have been consciously discarded. Because that is very much a part of nonideational meaning, either meant indirectly or, if not meant at all, then as comprehended by the interlocutor despite the speaker’s intentions. Again, this is © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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fraught with consequences for mediation, since the specific weight of F especially its semantic form- may be more, or less, relevant as a positive choice. A case most regrettably in point is the infamous “Coalition of the Willing” - of the willing to invade Iraq at all costs. The name, I doubt it not, was deliberate: the willing meant plainly to differentiate themselves from the un-willing - i.e. Germany and, above all, France, whom they also referred to pejoratively as the “old Europe.” One of the many Spanish translations that were coined at the time, Coalición de voluntades [coalition of wills] threw the not all too weak implicature overboard; the alternative translations “coalición de los dispuestos” [coalition of the disposed/willing] and “de los decididos” [the decided] were thus much more adequate. Notice that coalition is not as loaded politically: I submit that all that mattered was eschewing alliance in order not to activate memories of the antifascist alliance of yore. The mediator must, thus, be wary of what not to say for the first term and what actually to say for the second. Earlier there had been an even more illustrative case: As I was writing the first draft of this chapter, China and the US were at diplomatic loggerheads over the fact that a Chinese Mig had crashed in mid air with an American intelligence plane above the China Sea, as a result of which the Chinese pilot was missing and presumed dead, whilst the American plane was forced to perform an emergency landing on a Chinese island. All the fuss was over whether the American aircraft was a “spy” plane (as characterised by more independent Euronews), or a “surveillance” plane (as labelled by the more obsequious CNN) legally ogling from afar. In this specific context the semantic difference between an “apology,” which is what the Chinese demanded, and an “expression of regret,” which was as far as the Americans were ready to go, are not interchangeable: they give rise to relevantly different (even contradictory) politically charged metarepresentations. In most other contexts, instead, they would be very much interchangeable: ‘I’m sorry that your father is so ill, Peter,’ will not give Peter much food for metarepresentational lucubrations about whether I said “I’m sorry” rather than “I regret” in order to convey that I feel responsible. Pretending that every speaker chooses his words as an embattled Minister about to lose a no-confidence vote, carefully weighing and then rejecting each and every alternative (which is, by the way, impossible), and that, therefore, every word present counts as much as every absent word, is as preposterous in direct communication as it is damaging when it comes to the notion of fidelity in interlingual mediation. The rest is silence And there is more: a model of communication through speech cannot leave out the meaning of silence. True, silence is not a part of the utterance, but can be nevertheless meaning-laden. Very often, what is not being said is also an important part of what we understand, or, rather, of what we end up understanding after we have understood what has actually been said “officially.” Silence can be an ostensive means of communication -a negative stimulus, as it 44

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were- and when taken as such, it is interpreted via a metarepresentation of what is being left unsaid and a meta-metarepresentation of why it is left unsaid. What really counts is the metacommunicative framework As we can see, the motivations and intentions that bring together the interlocutors -i.e. that give rise to the speech act to begin with- are a decisive part of the totality of human communication which transcends speech production and comprehension. What I am trying to bring in explicitly, then, is that we are not simply after understanding the other person’s speech, his LPIs: we also want to understand his motives and metarepresent all that he may be willing to convey to (and/or hide from) us by producing that series of LPIs - and this we do on the basis of our own emotively-laden motivations. If a mediator does not take stock of why and what for the interlocutors who engage him have themselves engaged in producing speech percepts in each other, he may be able to “translate” most competently, but he cannot possibly mediate effectively - or, at least, optimally. Because what he must see to is not ensuring sheer LPIo/LPCi identity, whatever the subsequent social consequences, but rather ensuring a relevant identity, coincidence or overlapping of metarepresented -ideational and non-ideational- meaning that will be also as pragmatically adequate as circumstances demand, advise or allow. Direct communication can indeed be modelled short of the motivations and intentions that govern it on either side, and of the effects that comprehension produces. When dealing not with one but with two speech acts, however, it is impossible to extricate the mediator’s overall subjectivity as both an interlocutor to the speaker and speaker to the new interlocutor(s), because it is there in the very middle of both acts. No matter how hard he may try, the mediator cannot possibly reverbalise the speaker’s LPI exactly as he himself has understood it he must of necessity modify at least parts of its perspective. The question, then, is not whether but how he is adequately to choose this new perspective. And, again, he cannot possibly unless he takes stock of the metacommunicative purpose both of the original speech act and of his own, which may be a very different one indeed (as skopostheorie rightly stresses). Translation and mediation If translation proper is -borrowing Wittgenstein’s notion- a language game consisting in re-saying in a second act of speech in another language that which has been said in a previous act of speech in a given language, mediation, as I understand it, is a larger game, consisting mostly and mainly, but not necessarily, of translating. Mediation -which need not be interlingual at all- has, indeed, as its primary task to help produce ideational identity and/or pragmatic correspondence (but not necessarily both, as we shall see) in different subjects in different situations, but always as a means to a further end: achieving relevant communication. In view of the inescapable asymmetry between the ability, motivations, intentions and interests of any pair of interlocutors, these © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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metacommunicative purposes can radically vary from the first speech act to the second as a function of the mediator’s assessment of what counts as relevant identity this second time around13, by which I mean the necessary -from sufficient to optimum to total- degree of identity of ideational meaning coupled with an apt -from sufficient to optimum- correlation between effects pursued and achieved for the metacommunicative purposes at stake. If human communication as a whole is inseparable a) from the motivations, intentions, interests, intelligence, ability and sensitivity of all direct and indirect interlocutors and participants or stakeholders in a given event (including the mediator himself and any relevant third parties) and b) from the effects that comprehension produces on subjects, then mediation -whether interlingual or not- cannot be invariably limited to reverbalising a speaker’s “official” meaning meant. That having been said, if the interlocutors are so far apart that there is no way of establishing relevant identity between meaning meant and meaning comprehended, then there is nothing even the best mediator -whether monolingual or interlingual- can do: mediators too can face incurable patients. Translation as such, prototypically14, can indeed be defined and ontologically delimited simply as the noncommittal reproduction in a second speech act of ideational meaning as officially meant in a first act. But, again, this definition, useful as it is conceptually to demarcate translation, proves insufficient when it comes to actual “translating,” because a translator cannot be indifferent to the more general social stakes and consequences of his professional acts - and these consequences arise mainly from the global metarepresentations of meaning meant that the interlocutors end up producing on the basis of the mediator’s utterances: It is that that they will agree or disagree on, like or dislike, embrace, accept, tolerate or outright reject, and they will do so on different intellectual ideological and emotive grounds. As far as non-mediated communication, as I pointed out, García Landa is right: Understanding what I am saying, after all, is... understanding what I am saying. If I am irrelevant, or awkward, or uncouth, or simply stupid, that’s my and my interlocutor’s problem. There is no one in the middle to help us achieve what we cannot achieve on our own. As initiator of this act of speech, for instance, I assume full responsibility for what I want to say or hide, and how and when to say it. And you, as a reader, assume full responsibility for cooperating with me. Our success is in nobody’s hands but our own15. 13

Again, the mediator establishes the new dominant of his utterance (which may or may not coincide with the original one), and this is the decisive part of his manipulation. 14

Halverson (2000) asserts that translation is, precisely, a prototypical category with necessarily fuzzy edges. I think that my distinction between translation proper -as the central concept generalised from practice- and interlingual mediation as the variegated, even contradictory, practical realisation of the activity solves the basic theoretical problem. 15

Well, not quite: The publisher reserves his right to demand of me certain concessions or refuse to make my speech act public. You are understanding me with the publisher’s consent. 46

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But the moment responsibility for your understanding me relevantly is not yours alone but a professional mediator’s, and the moment making myself relevantly understood by you is no longer my exclusive responsibility but also that of a professional mediator, then you and I are both entitled to demand of him his best professional effort. We are entitled to expect that he understand the reasons behind my initiating this speech act (and not only what I am officially trying to say in it) better than you - and maybe even than I, and that he communicate more effectively than I - even if the specific rule of the specific game is to convey nothing but meaning as officially meant (which happens only in the most rarefied, severely institutionalised social settings). And it is also his responsibility to understand the reasons why you choose to participate in this speech act better than I - or maybe than you yourself. That is what turns a “mere” translator into a fully fledged mediator: his ability to understand beyond meanings officially meant (regardless of what he actually does with that understanding). A general theory of mediation of necessity must explain that the role of the mediator is, precisely, modulating -or, if you prefer, manipulatingmeanings as officially meant in order to help communication overcome all manner of hermeneutic and pragmatic barriers in order to serve its metacommunicative purpose. For that very reason, a general theory of interlingual mediation, although firmly anchored in García Landa’s theory of translation, cannot limit itself to explaining the reproduction and comprehension of meaning as officially meant - it must take a decisive step further and speak of the re-induction of metarepresented meaning within the larger framework of relevance theory and make room for all the adjustments that metacommunicatively successful communication entails. Relevance Theory developed Let us revisit the basic tenets of Relevance Theory: Sperber and Wilson define relevance as the relationship between the contextual effects produced on a specific interlocutor by any act of ostensive communication and the effort that it takes him to process it. Relevance is thus the exclusive domain of speech comprehension (even though it governs speech production insofar as a speaker, mostly unconsciously, “puts himself in the shoes” of his interlocutor). Let us recall the two Principles of Relevance (1986/1995:260 and foll.): The first principle is cognitive: Human cognition tends to be geared to the maximisation of relevance. The second one is communicative: Every act of ostensive communication communicates the presumption of its own optimal relevance. From these principles, Sperber and Wilson derive a presumption of optimal relevance, which consists of two assumptions: By definition, I could not tell you what concessions I have had to make; but rest assured - if there have been any, they have been trivial: You would not be reading this book if it was relevantly different from the one I wished to write. © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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a) The set of assumptions which the communicator intends to make manifest to the addressee is relevant enough to make it worth the addressee’s while to process the ostensive stimulus. b) The ostensive stimulus is the most relevant one compatible with the communicator’s abilities and preferences. There are two decisive corollaries: relevance is always 1) ad hoc, and 2) relative. I would say that these principles apply to any stimulus that the subject perceives as one of ostensive communication addressed to him or that he decides to process “as if” (he may attribute intentionality when there is in fact none, or miss intentionality when it is actually there, or simply mis-attribute it as directed to him rather than to someone else or vice versa). This qualification introduces the key element of attributed intentionality, which will become decisive when dealing with displaced situationality, which is typical of written translation16. Another decisive element, as I have stressed, is the intentionality behind the intentionality to communicate proper - the aims that the communicator pursues by communicating whatever it is he communicates. And yet another - the motive that impels him to communicate something at all in the first place, which can be totally or partially unconscious. I am not referring here to a speech act’s illocutionary force, which is, as it were, part and parcel of it: Illocutionary force is recoverable through propositional enrichment alone, and is normally perceived automatically as constitutive of an LPI. I have in mind, rather, the complex conscious and unconscious motivations that themselves give rise to and govern the (complex) pragmatic intention behind a speech act, which itself governs the act of speaking. I am not referring either to perlocutionary effects: they too are part of the speech act and are perceived automatically together with -if not necessarily as part of- its LPI, but rather to contextual, especially qualitative, effects. This distinction is clearly visible at the aesthetic level: aesthetic effects are hardly perlocutionary in the traditional sense. In any event, never mind what we call them or how they work, they are there, and they are independent of noetic comprehension, which explains how we can be affected differently by two acts of comprehension of the same LPI. Each time we perceive (the same) meaning meant anew, we experience different cognitive and qualitative effects. Such effects are, in the end, a function of our own ability, sensitivity and disposition there and then, which may or may not match our general ability, sensitivity or disposition, or the statistically average ability, sensitivity or disposition of any group of interlocutors. Yet this is not all: Understanding what a person means to convey to us propositionally, understanding the set of assumptions that person means to make manifest, is not enough. Whenever we have a personal stake in understanding, we want to understand, also, even more basically, what the speaker’s real 16

This is my disagreement with Eco (2001): there is no intentio operis; all there is is human intention attributed by the reader to the author. 48

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motives and intentions are, and whence they come. And not only when we smell a rat. True, on many occasions all that counts for the mediator’s purposes is “official” meaning, but by far not always - not even at political encounters in excelsis or with the most delicate documents. Speech comprehension is, indeed, consummated as soon as meaning as officially meant is understood. But human beings do not stop at that: We go on peeling the onion as obsessively as required by our perception of relevance. The old joke comes to mind of the two shrinks who cross each other on the street. ‘Good day, Doctor,’ go each of them, only to stop dead on their tracks and wonder suspiciously ‘What the hell did he mean by that?’ The overall importance of qualitative effects The basic limitation of relevance theory in its original formulation, I submit, is that it takes contextual effects to be merely cognitive, i.e. changes in the individual’s beliefs (which become strengthened, weakened, or altogether altered). The end effects of comprehension on an individual are always emotive, or qualitative, and have to do more with the phenomenal aspects of beliefs (i.e. to “what it is like” to entertain them) than with their ideational, propositional or notional aspect. If we incorporate this, then relevance theory neatly explains aesthetic and other qualitative effects, even without going into their physical and social nature (a vastly unexplored realm). This is what Pilkington (2000) has tried to do, contributing the last stone that I needed to finish my theoretical building as it presently stands before you. In the first volume of Durrel’s Alexandria Quartet, Justine, who as a young girl had been raped by sinister Capodistria, winces when, reading a musical score, gets to “d.c.” She immediately understands, of course, that “d.c.” stands for “da capo,” a normal instruction for the performer to play the passage once again from the beginning, but she immediately associates it with the sinister “Capodistria,” and the qualitative effect produced by her comprehension of this perfectly innocent LPI devastates her. I have an even more illustrative example, and from a most unexpected source. In one of the episodes of the old TV series Bonanza, old Cartwright and a painter now gone blind are standing atop a cliff overlooking a wonderful landscape. The former painter starts bemoaning the loss of his sight and evoking the landscape he had transferred to canvas so many times in the past; he then starts describing it as he visualises it in his mind. Cartwright comments that what the blind man has just depicted is more beautiful than what he, Cartwright, sees. The moment is rather corny, but most revealing: What Cartwright would have told his blind friend in our metalanguage is that the qualia of the second-degree perception produced in him by his interlocutor’s utterance were aesthetically more satisfying than the qualia of his visual perception. Thanks to the intermediate semantic representation flavoured by the non-semantic trappings of speech, transforming the seconddegree percept into an imaginary first-degree one simply “felt better” or “more moving” than perceiving the landscape directly. Such qualia could not have © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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been induced by ideational content alone (itself a propositional abstraction induced from the semantic representation): there is something about both ideational content and, in this instance, the way it was verbalised that did the trick. This “something that does the trick” is what a general theory of communication, translation and, even more so, mediation cannot shy away from conceptualising and incorporating. Some additional thoughts on similarity and identity As I was saying, the textualisation of speech through writing, and, lately, the preservation of the acoustic signals of oral speech have led us to treat speech as a “thing,” as an object that is not inside us but “out there” and can be observed and dissected as a corpse in the morgue. Indeed, treating speech as a dead body allows us to perform its autopsy, not once, but as often as we like. With a grain of salt, I dare submit that this reification of speech makes us tend to see translation as a problem of existential equivalence between linguistic chains rather than essential identity between speech perceptions and their causes, or, less metaphysically, equivalence between tokens rather than identity between different tokens and the underlying type. Writing is to speech what phonomagnetic recording is to sound and the movie camera to the image. Slow motion, for instance, allows us both to reproduce and decompose movement. Thanks to it, it is possible to visualise, say, the trajectory of a projectile or the muscular movements of athletes. On its part, sound recording permits a minute and repeated analysis of speech. Both enable us to perceive in much more detail the physical support of speech: the reality of sound and the movements of the tongue and other components of the phonatory apparatus. Thus the artificial17 nature of writing becomes glaringly clear, as does the way in which this artificiality has led literate humanity (still a rather minute fraction of the species) to a hypostasised view of speech as reading, as if true speech were on the page and orality was nothing but a sloppy and awkward version of those accomplished Chomskian surface structures neatly incarnated in immutable graphemes. We cannot even begin to speak about translation unless we first sweep out of our way this deranged concept of speech. In order to understand the perceptual nature of speech as distinct from its symbolisation in frozen written signs, I think it is most illustrative to take a look at musical “speech.” Beethoven’s Appassionata was originally a mental perception whose transmission requires, metaphorically speaking, a musicalspeech act. In order to make it accessible to others, he had to verbalise that musical perception thus making it sensorially perceptible - acoustically or, as with this text, by means of graphic clues enabling readers mentally to invoke the sounds. Unlike his famous improvisations, which he never wrote down and are 17

Artificial strictu sensu: writing is at the same time and artefact and an artifice invented by some societies. In no way do I presume to belittle such a precious tool. 50

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now lost forever, Beethoven did write down his Appassionata. Resorting to a conventional notation system, he reduced it approximately to graphic signs. Only approximately, though; as approximately as the system and his own trembling hand allowed him - no more (tempi, sound balances, phrasing and everything that turns sounds into music were since the very beginning a matter of... well, interpretation18). We can say that the communication of Beethoven’s Appassionata will have succeeded for us if we can invoke an identical musical perception. Short of mentally evoking it from memory, this requires the semiotic or the physical stimulus to be reproduced. As writing, musical notation allows for the approximate graphic representation of sounds; but nobody (least of all the overwhelming majority of music lovers who cannot read a musical score) would think that Beethoven’s Appassionata is in the score - and much less that it is the score. What is in the score are the graphical semiotic clues that allow us to re-evoke inferentially the musical perception (and, on the basis of this perception, to play the notes on an instrument)19. It is important to stress that since conventional notation is only approximate, all that turns those notes from mere sounds into real music is a matter of interpretation - which mutatis mutandis applies as well to any act of reading20. But where is Beethoven’s Appassionata when nobody is playing it or humming it mentally? Where his legendary improvisations, language and past speech-acts are: nowhere. Except that scores and CDs, books and answeringmachine tapes make it possible for us to preserve the acoustic chains, or, more indirectly, the graphical clues of the acoustic chains once used to verbalise 18

Barbara Hendricks put it most eloquently some time a go in an interview: “I try and think what the composer wanted me to convey through the score he wrote” - the score is a means, clues! This is, also, what the great Sergio Celibidache had to say on that, well, score: “I do nothing other than find out what the composer wanted. For he had an experience [i.e. an imaginary acoustic perception, S.V.] and sought the shorthand with which to write it down. We start with this shorthand in order to come back to the experience” (sleeve notes to his recording of Haydn’s symphonies 103 and 104, EMI 5 56518 2:6.)

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Two relevant cases come to mind: In the last movement of his Sixth Symphony, Mahler demanded a louder bang from his side-drum player than the instrument was capable of producing - his mental perception could not be reproduced by means of the intended instrument (Osimo and Venuti would have called this additional imaginary decibels “the remainder”). In Argentina there was a legendary teacher of composition and harmony, the Austrian Erwin Leuchter, who, I am told, refused to listen to live or recorded performances of any score on the grounds that no specific performer could do real justice to it - so he proceeded to perceive those works directly on the basis of the written notes... as if he refused to see any performance of Hamlet on the grounds that it could never do justice to Shakespeare!

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As Peter Brook (The Herald Tribune, January 27-28:22) points out, while fearless in his interpretation of lesser plays, in the case of Hamlet “I was so fearful that I didn’t do anything at all but leave it to speak for itself, which is a great mistake, because plays can’t speak for themselves (my italics, SV)” - nor can any other texts! © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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percepts in ad hoc musical or speech acts. There is no other way: no matter how many times it is re-enacted, every musical or speech act is a unique, nonce event. In the case of second-degree signs -i.e. of speech- the seeming immobility of a written text masks the crucial fact a) that it is impossible to re-verbalise an LPI spontaneously exactly the same way (no poet can spontaneously write exactly the same poem twice), and b) that each act of comprehension is unique, so that even though perceptual identity continues to be the yardstick of comprehension, the contextual effects (cognitive or emotive) are never the same. Outside a specific act of comprehension (or a myriad specific acts of comprehension) there is no text, just contrasts on paper or bits of information in chips. This brings us to the relationship between the Appassionata that Beethoven conceived and perceived mentally, and the one we know: No two readings of it are exactly alike. Which of the versions we have listened to in our lives is Beethoven’s Appassionata? All of them, I submit. The different renditions are, to be sure, different, but they are, all, Beethoven’s Appassionata: They are identical, not just similar or equivalent to it. How can two things be identical to a third yet different from each other? Simply, the relationship between each of them and the third is different from the relationship between the twain. The tertium comparationis does not exist at the physical, objective level: It only exists virtually - like language and all those past speech-acts that seem somehow to be stored in our memory or in a CD-ROM, or like this one that has come to life now that you read these lines and that will have died as soon as you stop reading them (let me prove it to you, my reader: try and remember verbatim the preceding sentence that you read a couple of seconds ago!). Again with our due grain of salt, the relationship between any specific token and its abstract type is essential, whilst that between tokens is existential - there is a categorial leap between these two classes of relationships; so that the different readings can indeed be compared to each other, dissected, declared better or worse, slower or faster, more or less faithful to the ideal model each one of us has in his head. If Beethoven had left us a recording of an interpretation of his sonata (as Ravel did of his Mother Goose) it would be just a version - yet another “verbalisation” of his perception that could be compared and found similar or equivalent to other renditions, but not the perception itself. By the way, most critics agree that Ravel’s versions are not very good; those by many other pianists are much better, and nobody believes that those by composers are necessarily more faithful. Perceiving and expressing are different activities requiring different talent and abilities - which, incidentally, explains why so many translations are better than their originals - or the frequent case of literary geniuses such as Dostoievski, who are better at perceiving than at writing. Both in the case of the natural perception of music or the second-degree perception of meaning meant, this “better” is normally judged from the standpoint of the effects of perception (emotive, aesthetic, cognitive) over and 52

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above the purely musicological or philological aspects. Generally speaking we tend to consider “better” the musical or verbal version that affects us more in tune with the intention that we presume in the composer or speaker addressing us (friend or foe, essayist, watchmaker or poet) - the one that more aptly informs us, moves us, amuses us, etc21. As we know, the effects of a perception may be more important than the perception itself. It is important to stress a fundamental caveat, though: Musical perception is simply a first-degree perception of a natural object - acoustic waves. Speech perception, instead, is a second-degree perception of a social object - meaning meant, based, of course, on the natural perception of sounds or graphic signs in which the linguistic signs giving it speech form are couched. However, it does not consist in the perception of those sounds or signs, of their “music” or their “noise,” but of the intention to communicate, of meaning meant, of a message that -at least propositionally- can be verbalised in countless ways by means of the signs of one or several languages. Let us go back to speech proper. As all other texts, this one is also a verbalisation of the perception behind it (there is, for starters, another one: the Spanish version). It is the identity between my original perception and yours that counts as communicative success, not the similarity of the original or translated linguistic chains that may serve as its vehicle (as you know, part of this LPI –or, rather, sequence of LPIs– was originally verbalised in Spanish). These lines you are reading, in other words, are but the score of the speech perception that I am trying to produce in you by verbalising it in English. As I put it down, it vanishes, and you are left to search, among these bits of circumstantial evidence I leave behind, for the ghost of my speech act, which shall only succeed inasmuch as you can perceive what I am perceiving now (or, rather, what I perceived as I was writing): Again, not something similar or equivalent, but identical. You may re-read these lines and your perception -and most especially its contextual effects- will never be exactly the same (nor will be those experienced by other readers including myself when I read me again); but the speech act will succeed each time in so far as, despite all those differences, identity persists between what I mean to say to you and what you understand whether I manage to convince you or not. Such identity is often impossible to prove: it can only be postulated; but social practice tells us that it exists, since we can understand each other with respect to our physical environment and social world.

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And sometimes we prefer a version that we know to be less “faithful.” Even today most music lovers may prefer the traditional interpretations of the Appassionata than the frankly more anaemic consented by period fortepiani. Personally, may I add, I am still more moved by Furtwängler’s romantic Fifth than by Norrington’s musicologically impeccable rendition. Identically, as we shall see, there are translations that are not so good qua translations, but that many readers nevertheless prefer as texts om the target language. © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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It can also be posited that if Ravel’s own performance of, say, his Ma mere l’oie is but a token of his perception, then Shakespeare’s verbalisation of Hamlet is but a token of his. As Kipling says about writing a poem “There are nine and twenty ways... And never think that one of them is right!22” In other words, originals are not types but tokens - canonical tokens, if you will, but nothing more. A translation cannot be identical to the original (i.e. to another token), but the LPI it verbalises can -and, if it is to be successful, must- be relevantly identical to the LPC it generates. A case in point is that of multilingual international treaties, which are supposed to be equally valid in all versions, regardless of the original language (as a matter of fact, there usually is none, since the putative original -as this very book!- ends up being a composite of back-translations from the other languages23). Whatever the differences between them, the versions of such treaties are all deemed to be verbalised tokens of a single LPI: there is but one Treaty. The fact that in some instances the parties agree to one of the language versions prevailing in cases of conflicting interpretations does not turn it into the original, but into a primus inter pares - i.e. the recognised canonical token, the sole purpose of which is, precisely, to facilitate interpretation of the LPI. Whereas for instrumental translation the canonical verbalisation of the LPI is normally irrelevant, in a documentary translation, on the other hand, there must also exist a certain relationship between the relevant attributes of its canonical and any other verbalisation: such a translation not only reverbalises an LPI, but also represents its canonical verbalisation in the new language. To quote an all too obvious example, your understanding and mine of Archimedes’s principle is identical, not similar or equivalent - regardless of the degree of similarity or equivalence between his own verbalisation and those we have encountered or come to our minds when we evoke it or verbalise it (and regardless of the pragmatic effects of such verbalisation) - and it can also be verbalised in any sign language. This relevant identity of speech perceptions is normally manifested as a certain relationship between their respective formal spaces - but that is a mere statistical coincidence. The old argument around a “sufficient degree of similarity” or the “necessary degree of equivalence” is nothing but a hypostasis that has plagued translatology prior to the Landan revolution. At long last we can see the problem on its feet: different 22

Notice that, bereft of rhythm and the effects it produces, the mathematical figure becomes so irrelevant as to sound ridiculous: “There are twenty-nine ways and none is the right one.” Why 29 rather than 30 or 100 or 127? What could be the point of keeping the exact figure in, say, a Spanish translation of the poem if it were not endowed with a similar functionality? Once the effects are gone, all we are left with is a ideational content awkwardly expressed. But, of course, it must be translated whenever the poem is, since it appears in the sacrosanct original! 23

For an analysis of the phenomenon at the EU level, see Perspectives 9:4, 2001 (with contributions by Schäffner, Wagner, Dollerup. Koskinen, Stolze and Šarčevič). 54

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verbalisations are to be more or less similar or be judged more or less equivalent in so far as they make possible relevant identity of meaning. The fact that ideational content can be reverbalised without much ado is essential for communication and translation: My personal contention is that the species has survived against all natural odds because we can communicate “what we think,” which, by allowing for collective intentionality, has also made possible our the development of our productive forces and social superstructure. The relative ineffability of “what we feel,” on the other hand, has not stood in the way of our discovering penicillin, figuring out the speed of light, guessing at the existence of anti-matter, building the pyramids, putting together the Space Shuttle programme or devising penne alla putanesca. Speech, in other words, was not developed out of a need to communicate feelings; this is a subsidiary use to which it is obviously less suited - a bit like the hands to playing the cello. This ontological difference between the ideational and the pragmatic (let alone between the ideational and the poetic) explains, for instance that there is but one science –possible, i.e. verbalisable in, and therefore translatable into, any language– and as many literatures as there are dialects, often remiss to effective, or, rather, relevant translation. What an LP allows us to represent is, I submit, basically -maybe exclusively- ideational meaning. Everything else is a byproduct of speech perception and, therefore, speech production and comprehension proper. I believe that we shall not be able to solve the problem theoretically or practically unless we establish a clear ontological distinction between the cognitive and the emotive – regardless of the fact that, in actual practice, this distinction becomes ever more difficult to make. The gist of successful communication lies simply in the identity of the speech perceptions, which is its purpose. This identity cannot be verified in a laboratory (as a matter of fact, no one can be absolutely certain that he has understood or been understood). But its empirical corroboration is an everyday fact: People do succeed at communicating most of the time, or at least often enough to ensure the survival of the species through collective intentionality. If this metaphysical uncertainty is something that we put up with in our everyday exchanges, where so much that is personally relevant to us is at stake, why should it obsess us that translation is subject to the same limitations? Things cannot be that bad if we somehow or other go on living, basically certain that we reasonably (read “relevantly”) understand Pythagoras’ theorem, the receipt for coq au vin, the London tube guide, Aristotle’s’ philosophy and Hamlet -in the original or in countless oral or written translations- even if we are left with that nagging doubt whether that which we have understood is really what others have understood themselves, and whether what we have understood is what the famous or anonymous initiators of such speech acts really meant. Empirical research can but get to the doors of the social nature of such identity (no mean thing, at that!), but it cannot penetrate it - not for the nonce, that I am aware. Once we have understood and accepted this stubborn fact of life, we can

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effectively orient and develop the conceptualisation, practice and teaching of translation and interpretation. Thinking for speaking There is a whole school of linguistic thought, initiated by Humboldt and articulated in the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis, according to which each language i.e. each particular organisation of speech- determines the way its speakers perceive the world. It is undoubtedly true that, within certain limits and up to a certain point, the instrument determines the task: Beethoven himself did not write for the piano the way he wrote for the violin, and his own piano transcription of his violin concerto is wonderfully illustrative in this respect. But which is the task that languages as semiotic instruments determine? Together with Slobin, I think that the task is not that of perceiving, but that of verbalising -i.e. producing- perceptions. Slobin proceeds to an experiment that is as simple as it is splendidly illuminating: He presents a sample of children between the ages of three and nine, speakers of different languages, with the same story illustrated in a series of images and asks them to describe what they see. Children, of course, do not describe “what they see” but, rather, their interpretation of what they perceive, of the movement that they themselves attribute to the succession of static contrasts. Slobin asserts that the semantic and syntactic encoding of certain categories, such as “perfective” and “imperfective” (Spanish-speaking children, for instance, distinguish the child who “cayó” [≈ fell] from the dog that “corría” [≈ was running]) does not correspond to different ways of “seeing24.” We would be hard pressed to claim that everything about an image that could be grammatically encoded in all languages is implicitly present when we look at it. To a great extent, states Slobin, grammar marks distinctions that are relevant to discourse (i.e. to speech production). When speaking Spanish, I cannot but present my representation of past events in relationship to their beginning or end (with the perfective tenses) or independently of either (with the imperfective ones)25; according to Slobin, I cannot but adopt a grammaticalised point of view. “For instance, in English I might say: “The bees are chasing the dog” or “The dog is being chased by the bees.” Neither of these viewpoints -active or 24

Gile (1985) mentions a similar experiment with his students.

25

The difference between these two Spanish verbalisations of the same historic event: “El 12 de octubre de 1492 Colón descubrió América” and “El 12 de octubre de 1492 Colón descubría América” (undistinguishable in English) is one of perspective. The difference lies in “visualising” the fact as a consummated event or an event that is in process. This perspective Spanish forces me to grammaticalise only in the simple forms of the past tense (as well as in their compound counterparts), the only ones to maintain the aspectual difference. Russian, on its part, makes that difference obligatory in all verbal forms and tenses, including the infinitive. 56

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passive- is in the percept. Active and passive constructions serve to organize the flow of information connected to discourse. Thus, even within a single language, grammar provides a set of options for schematizing experience for the purposes of verbal expression. Any utterance is multiply determined by what I have seen or experienced, my communicative purpose in telling you about it, and the distinctions that are embodied in my grammar. The world does not present “events” and “situations” to be encoded in language. Rather, experiences are filtered through language into verbalized events. A “verbalized event” is constructed on-line, in the process of speaking” (1996:74-75).

As Slobin points out, it is unlikely that all speakers are completely aware of this, but no doubt every utterance is a selective schematisation of the concept it expresses, a schematisation that, up to a point, depends on the grammaticalised meanings in a language, which the speaker chooses in order to express himself verbally. For Slobin, the expression of experience in linguistic terms constitutes thinking for speaking. We encounter the contents of our mind in a special way when we access them in order to use them, i.e. the activity of thinking acquires a particular quality when it is used in the activity of speaking. In the evanescent lapse that we have to produce our utterances in actual speech acts we fit our thoughts into the available linguistic frames (i.e. we produce LPIs)26. Thinking for speaking involves selecting those features of objects and events that a) fit some conceptualisation thereof, and b) are readily encodable into the language. As it acquires language, a child learns certain forms of thinking for speaking. One way of investigating this suggestion is to compare the ways in which speakers of different languages depict the same events. And he adds most tellingly: “This approach is well known to students of translation, and there is a fascinating literature showing that translations of the same text cannot help but add or remove nuances in accord with the characteristics of the given language” (ibid.:76).

We can begin to have a glimpse of a fact that is decisive for translation: A semantic representation is nothing but a possible way of semantically framing a concept or a proposition, but is not to be confused with the intended concept or proposition (i.e. the LPI) themselves. Without being aware of it, Slobin opens yet another window on speech: His discovery allows us to explain, contrario sensu, the difference between inner speech and speech proper. In the first instance, it is no longer a matter of thinking for speaking, but of speaking for thinking, which explains the sui generis organisation of inner speech, its apparent formlessness, its permanently incomplete articulation, in a thousand directions at a time and in no one in particular - that chaos that Joyce can barely 26

This is what Neubert (1985) calls, precisely, framing, in order to point out that what distinguishes transparently “translationesean” style is an antinatural, un-idiomatic linguistic “framing” of meaning. © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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imitate (after all, he was indeed thinking for speaking) in those masterful last pages of Ulysses. Moreover, not only do different languages impose, favour, make possible, impede or prevent certain grammatical or even semantic points of view, but each offers its speakers different repertoires of possible viewpoints. Thus, within the limits of his (activated knowledge of) his own language, a speaker at once a) can choose the way to express a perception of his environment or his world, and b) must do so. This dialectics of freedom and necessity is another constant of social phenomena which, inevitably, has decisive consequences for translation. The semantic representation shibboleth If the objects of spontaneous communication are LPs, then there must be an ontological difference between ideational meaning meant (and/or comprehended) and semantic meaning (linguistic, i.e. systemic, dictionaryitemised). The question is where exactly to find it. I submit that all too often this boundary is mistakenly drawn between the systemic potential meaning of each isolated lexical unit and the more or less cohesive meaning of more or less cohesive chains (basically clauses or sentences), since, once syntactically articulated, the semantic potential of lexical units becomes co-text-bound (NB co-text, not context) and, therefore, automatically reduced. There is, and I think here we all agree, an important distinction between systemic meaning potential and semantic representation: Any more or less cohesive chain may give rise to a semantic representation, which is merely a more or less plausible interpretation of its meaning in propositional terms - something a machine can normally grasp even better than humans, as in the case of the English sentence “time flies like an arrow,” for which a computer found five different cohesive non-metaphorical interpretations: 1) “time proceeds as quickly as an arrow proceeds,” 2) “measure the speed of flies in the same way that you measure the speed of an arrow,” 3) “measure the speed of flies in the same way that an arrow measures the speed of flies,” 4) “measure the speed of flies that resemble an arrow,” 5) “flies of a particular kind, called ‘time flies’, are fond of an arrow” (Pinker 1994:209)27. This, precisely, is the tremendous advantage of language over all other semiotic systems: It allows for semantic representations, i.e. for rich, detailed and flexible conceptual schemata of experience framed in propositional form that can be arrived at and manipulated on the basis of the linguistic meanings of utterances. So that there is, indeed, an important distinction to be made between systemic meaning potential and semantic representation. What, to my mind, is not always clear is that it is still a distinction between linguistic levels - a distinction within language. The divide between systemic meaning and meaning 27

A colleague of mine, by the way, has come up with yet another representation: “The flies of time like an arrow.” 58

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meant, I suggest, must be sought at the level above: at the intersection of language and thought28, between semantic representation and intended sense between Fo(SmH) and LPI. As Gutt (1991:24-25) so clearly explains: “The semantic representation is a representation that is the output of the language module of the mind. However, because the language module of the mind handles only linguistic data, the semantic representations, which it produces as output, are not normally complete and fully truth-conditional propositions or assumptions, but rather assumptions schemas or ‘blueprints for propositions’... which need to be developed and enriched in a number of different ways... Verbal communication involves two distinct kinds of mental representations: semantic representations that are the output of the language module of the mind, and thoughts with propositional forms that are derived from semantic representations by further processing. The way in which audiences get from semantic representations to propositional forms crucially involves the use of context [i.e. all situationally relevant linguistic and nonlinguistic parameters, S.V.].”

The existence of such a specialised language module (as suggested by Fodor (1975), Jackendoff (1992), et al.), independent of whatever modules generate and process conceptual information (i.e. thought) is corroborated neurophysiologically: The lexical meaning of words, which, together with their syntactic features and phonological form, is a basic component of each word and therefore part of linguistic competence, is vulnerable to aphasia. Conceptual representations, on the other hand, which are outside linguistic competence, are not - even if they are vulnerable to other forms of mental deterioration (Paradis 1997). Since in real life we are never really faced with sentences but with socially relevant, intentional utterances, we automatically assume any isolated sentence to be such an utterance, a manifestation of an intended sense, and therefore treat it as such and do what we do in every similar case: On the basis of the principle of relevance we try to come up with an adequate, or at least plausible interpretation of meaning as meant by a specific if imaginary human being - an LPC. Even a semantically incoherent but grammatically cohesive sentence as Chomsky’s famous “colourless green ideas sleep furiously” will tend to be perceived and processed as an ultimately logical -evidently metaphorical, if cryptic- intentional utterance29, by the same mental process that allows Alice to “understand” from Jabberwocky that, clearly, “someone killed someone.” Bakhtin (1978:281) puts it most transparently: we do not exchange propositions any more than we exchange words - nor do we react to 28

Or rather, lucubration. As Roothauer (1978) points out, a musician definitely thinks about the score he is composing, but most likely not in words. 29

For instance: “The faun dreams that he is sleepless in the green forest whose colours are drowned by the wild din of the beasts.” © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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propositions, but to what people mean to communicate by them. Because we tend to treat more or less cohesive segments of language as intentional acts of speech, we can ultimately fool ourselves into believing that we understand them as utterances, and therefore into believing that we can translate them - i.e. that we will be translating speech rather than transcoding language. It is precisely here, at the level of semantic representations, where the virtual, abstract, openended level of language intersects with the concrete, specific, determinate level of speech, that both the most sophisticated machine translation and most linguistically competent but communicatively naive translation takes place: Here too, at a definitely more sophisticated level than a machine, many unsophisticated translators fail to look for an LPI behind the semantic representation, mistake it for the utterance’s intended sense, and end up conveying the former for the latter, i.e. semantic form for communicative content - Fi(SnH) for LPIo. They fail to see that one cannot “translate” a semantic representation any more than one can “translate” an isolated word, since to translate is to re-produce the LPI behind the utterance that uses the semantic representation as its semantic form. García Landa explains this myth: the LPIo that communication and translation are meant to convey, although very much present in the act of writing, is absent from the act of reading - it must be inferred. All pedagogical exhortations to translate “meaning” rather than words, are, in fact, but an injunction to infer the LPIo - to translate on the basis of a coherent LPIi. It is also at the semantic representation level that, equally fooled, the naive user will seek equivalence (and scream if he does not detect it). This is the bane of the mediator: the semantic representation shibboleth - the ontological mistaking of more or less cohesive linguistic meaning for meaning meant, or, much more simply, of meaning for sense. (I have never been able to understand why so many English-writing translatologists refuse to adopt the terminological distinction; they must see something that I do not, because I cannot believe that they do not see what I do.) I realise that my suggestions must be analysed more deeply than I have done here, but I do think that most polemics about textual equivalence boil down to a different weighing of the communicative status of the semantic representation. The object of speech perception Which is, then, the object of a speech perception understood as a complex perceptual space? Let us proceed step by step. I was saying that, as you read, your retina cannot register but waves of different length; that is all that our human eyes are good for. In your case, all that you perceive through your eyes are contrasts, black drawings on a white background - which is all that an illiterate person would perceive. You know, of course, that they are not just “drawings”30 but letters in the Roman alphabet, because, by automatically 30

As they indeed were for many illiterate medieval copyists who simply copied drawings!

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applying your hermeneutic package on the basis of the principles of relevance you perceive a communicative intention behind them. You may like or dislike the message, and maybe the message you get is not the one I wished to convey to you, but you (think that you) know that these letters, words and clauses are not just a string of linguistic signs, because –rightly or wrongly– what your hermeneutic, second-degree perceptual apparatus has you perceive is, precisely, a communicative intention and a message, so that contrasts are intentional drawings, drawings are letters, letters are words, words are clauses, and clauses are a message31. This is what you really perceive consciously. And this is why you are taking the trouble of reading my book. Your brain –we still do not know how, that is something that natural scientists are trying to find out– transforms this natural, purely optical perception into an intentional message exactly the same way it transforms those fickle thousand points of light in your TV screen into the images of Antonio Banderas. Translation theory as a social science is as interested in these processes as is the theory of literary perception or that of chess - i.e. very little32. The object of a speech perceptual space then, is what the other person wishes to say - the ideational meaning he is trying to convey. Thus, as García Landa explains, when we have such a perception we perceive (or think that we perceive) that which the other person is trying to say, and, at the same time, we have a direct or indirect awareness that that which we perceive comes from that flesh-and-blood human being who is speaking to us. This is, again, the 31

I think it is Searle who wondered what would happen if a cat stepping on a PC’s keys happened to “write” Hamlet. From the perceptual point of view, nothing. We would still attribute intentionality to it and read it as an intended message, wondering whether a mysterious sentient hand had not guided the cat the same way it guides the choreography of letters on a Ouija board. Turning back to musical perception, there are some computers that “compose” string quartets. But when the moment comes to play them, instrumentalists proceed as if there had actually been an intended acoustic perception behind the notes on the score: neither Hamlet as “written” by the cat nor a Haydn quartet as “composed” by a computer can “play themselves.” Of course, some computers actually produce synthesised sound. But when we, humans, listen to them, we hear intended music, not aleatory noise: As with those funny noises by the alarm clock that “tells” us that it is time to get up, we cannot but let our perceptual apparatus cheat us. 32

I fail to see why the black box would play a more crucial or more specific or even mpre interesting role in translation or interpretation than in chess playing, painting, mathematical calculus or, well, just plain everyday talking. Why would the black box be more decisive in translating a sonnet than in conceiving it in the first place - or in reading it and, perhaps more importantly, enjoying it? It is indeed likely that a more perfect knowledge of physical (neurophysiological and other) processes at work in speech production and comprehension help us refine translation practice or pedagogy -for instance, by explaining certain mistakesthe same way that understanding muscular movements can help optimise a pianist’s technical prowess; but, much as they may depend on it in the end, neither translation nor music “are” in the physical world. Translation theory is not to be confused, therefore, with the neurophysiological description of a translator’s cerebral activity. © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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difference between natural and social perceptions: the object of a social perception is, always, an intention. As I mentioned, there is another crucial fact: for communication to be established, it is not necessary that there be identity between meaning meant and meaning understood. Regardless of its eventual success or failure, communication as such is established as soon as we have understood that there is a communicative intention addressed to us, as soon as we perceive that someone is trying to communicate something to us and we decide to play the game: The whole interpretative process is triggered by the stimulus of ostensive communication. This is where mutual orientedness (Toolan 1996) and relevance start working. Speech comprehension (and, sometimes, even speech production) comes later. This is crucial. Before you even begin to read this book, before I start speaking to you and you start understanding me, you must have taken the trouble to get it, to find a place and a time, and to open it. Why would you do that unless you had your own motives and interests that are prior to your understanding, which in one way or another, influence and can even determine whether and what you understand, at least initially? Obviously, in order for communication to succeed it is not enough for it to have been established. At the speech perceptual level, success in communication equals ideational comprehension. I may utterly detest physics and most particularly Archimedes’ principle, still, I can understand it, and, to that extent, its “author” has succeeded at communicating with me. But is it enough? Most of the time, not quite. The moment we want to model mediation, the mediator’s metacommunicative intentions vis-à-vis the speaker to the left of the model and his interlocutor to the right, cannot possibly be cut off: They are part and parcel of the scene that begins with the moment of original speech production on the left and ends in mediated speech comprehension on the right. If they are left out, one ends up with an intelligent, free, but ultimately dehumanised mediator. This, I repeat, is why I cannot really accept as an absolute truth that the translator is not, not ever, interested in metacommunicative intentions or effects, that he is there to re-say what has been said, pragmatic, referential and ethical warts and all (which, once more, no doubt is what he is required to do in certain specific if statistically most exceptional situations). This is, precisely, what at an infinitely less sophisticated level, most people propound who see the translator as a human dictionary or, at best, as a bilingual secretary, and, unfortunately, the way many of even the best practitioners view themselves (Pearl (1995) is a particularly revealing case in point). And here we must distinguish between manipulating form or content and passing judgement on either. Normally, the mediator may not, deontologically, pass judgement on the truth of what is said or the intentions with which it is said; I am not, however, talking necessarily about judging what is said or the intentions behind it, but the effectiveness with which it is said- on the basis of why and what for it is said and understood. 62

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And there is, as we have seen, one more thing: the effects of comprehension. What really counts for the individual in everyday communication is, in the end, what it “feels like” to have understood: the qualitative metaeffects of the cognitive effects of comprehension - which oftentimes are but a sheer emotive resonance of ideational comprehension. How are we going to judge, I ask again, literary speech and literary translation “independently” of the qualitative (in this case, aesthetic) effects a) pursued and b) actually achieved by the author, and c) pursued and d) actually achieved by the translator? A trivial example Before attempting to model communication (and, later, monolingual and interlingual mediation) from this larger perspective, let us try and take stock of the relevant factors impacting everyday human communication through speech. Imagine the following situation: A young upper-middle class Spaniard walks into a New York bar and sees two white upper-middle class girls alone at the bar. One of them is obviously prettier than the other, yet the man, without quite knowing why, feels drawn towards the less attractive of the two. From this unconscious impulse arises his conscious motivation to speak to her. He still does not know what he is going to say, but he does know what he wants to achieve with whatever he finally manages to utter: his main intention is to break the ice, and, at the same time, to give a nice impression. Through an avalanche of inner-speech acts, his head is now teeming with a series of perceptions of possible English utterances: ‘Are you alone, ladies?’; ‘Can I buy you, girls, a drink?’; ‘Are you waiting for your boyfriends or is it my lucky day?’ (he thinks “it” rather than the more idiomatic “this” because, like me, he is not a native English speaker), and a myriad more. Finally he makes up his mind, walks towards the women and decides, probably half consciously, to utter ‘Sorry, girls; may I sit down?’ That is what he now says through an act of oral speech. The utterance -though the young man is mostly unaware of it- has a phonomorphosyntactic structure and a semantic potential, is pronounced with an interrogative intonation and is instrumented in a colloquial register. Our hero probably does not know that there are virtual systems gravitating upon each of his utterance’s components it (in our case, those commonly referred to as the English language), which allow the girls to identify and understand it, while at the same time perceiving that he is a non-native speaker, in all probability a Hispanic (which is not altogether true, since, according to the social practices and experience governing the girls’ perception, Spaniards are not Hispanic, but impeccably white - unbeknownst to him, our young man has to overcome an ethnic prejudice wrongly applied to him: he will have to correct his interlocutors’ social perceptual apparatus). The young man blurts out his phrase awkwardly, but his voice is pleasant and his body language endearing. All of this he does and is perceived at the same time. © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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The utterance has been proffered in a specific social situation, upon which gravitate, as we have already seen, the participants’ personal experiences, history and culture, as well as a reduced microworld: that of the bar. This situation, on its part, is embedded in a specific historic period (in which it is possible and customary, for instance, for girls to have a drink unescorted and for young men to approach them), and, within it, it occurs at a specific moment. We have also seen that these social practices and experiences do not completely overlap: our young man may have a hard time learning his social ropes. As our hero walked towards them, the girls have noticed in his gait both anxiety and excitement; the less attractive one likes the half-clumsy half-brazen gesture that punctuates his utterance, as well as his trembling voice. Her friend, who is not feeling congenial, is less impressed. All of this they both perceive simultaneously and, as we can imagine, they find the utterance’s morphosyntactic structure and semantic content less important than the Latin accent or the register, which is both cultivated and colloquial. Even the utterance itself matters less than the man’s aspect, body language and voice. The ladies have sieved this half-acoustic half-visual stimulus through their respective conscious and unconscious filters. The prettier one thinks she is the actual beneficiary, but since she does not like the young man too much, she decides not to encourage him and replies: ‘I’d love to, but someone’s waiting for me’ - a meaning meant and, also, a blatant lie, which the young man probably sees through, but then it is her friend he is interested in: he does not give a hoot about the prettier girl’s meaning meant. Her friend, who is open but afraid (without knowing why), condescends: ‘OK; but just for a few minutes ’cause we’re leaving.’ This gives rise to the metarepresentation our young man was dying for: he may be in business after all! Without it, the series of speech acts would have ended pretty much there and then. Within this newly established social context, the ensuing dialogue is a coherent and cohesive exchange of utterances - all of them lies. ‘Exactly how many minutes?’ asks the young man, who has anything but a clock in mind; ‘About half an hour,’ answers the girl, choosing a time lapse that will be enough not to discourage the stranger while providing her, at the same time, with an excuse for an eventual retreat. Her friend, noticing what is really going on despite any and all meanings officially meant by anybody, chooses to help her and interjects ‘I really have to go: Bob’s expecting me,’ - yet another blatant lie: there is no Bob and he is not expecting her. The woman knows, however, that relevance principles gratias, a) the man will interpret that she has, or at least wishes to make manifest to him that she does have, a boyfriend called Bob, who is expecting her, and b) her friend will assume as much and thank her for saving both their faces. So she, begging and relieved, lies in turn: ‘Can’t you stay a little longer?’ The man, trying to hide his elation, adds his own lie: ‘If she’s got to go, let her.’ The friend, saying the truth for the first time in our documentary replies: ‘You’re in good company anyhow.’ And also not lying for the fist time, the other girl: ‘OK; see you!’ 64

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Our young people have managed to understand each other talking thanks to all the factors that have united them in this social transaction, within which they share, in particular, certain pre-comprehension schemes that allow them precisely to grasp the sense the others are making (where, for instance, “with you” is taken to mean “to chat for a while,” “Bob” a relevant acquaintance possibly a boyfriend- etc.). Whatever the final outcome of this story, we can assume that, so far, communication among the three has succeeded, that the Satyr has managed to produce his intended series of speech percepts in the Nymphs, who, in turn, have evoked in their minds a series of speech percepts identical to the ones he wished to produce and vice versa. So that what one meant officially to convey and what the others have officially understood are, for all practical purposes, the same thing – regardless of the different interests, emotions and perspectives of each character at each moment, and of the way their mutual comprehension may affect them at each turn. Before we leave our three characters forever, let us pause at what a mediator might have done had the young man and the girls not had a common language: Think: would you have mediated exactly the same way, would you have limited yourself to reverbalising back and forth meanings officially meant with utmost equanimity if you had been the young man’s friend, or the friend of either of the girls, or an amicable bystander, or a professional employed by one or the other of them or by the owner of the bar? My development of García Landa’s models The developed model of verbal communication It reads as follows: 1) Every more or less complex successful (NB!) act of speech D (whether oral V, written T, or inner I) in a given language o is a social transaction whereby someone (the subject of production), out of a conscious motivation W, governed by an adequate unconscious predisposition to cooperate Z, with a main pragmatic intention Y and secondary pragmatic intentions y, communicates a propositionally more or less complex speech percept intended LPI which is a function of the activation of a given set of linguistic systems o together with a set of pre-comprehension schemes, knowledge base or passing theories K. 2) To that effect, he sets in motion a complex mental operation which involves mainly constructing and presenting to his interlocutor(s) a finished social product which is a sign chain F in that language o. Such chain consists of a) a phonomorphosyntactic structure X (actualising a certain phonomorphosemantic system L), b) a semantic potential S (actualising a semantic system H), c) a rhythmicoprosodic structure V (actualising a rhythmicoprosodic system R), and d) a register J (from a register series Q33). 33

It is not certain whether registers constitute a system. © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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This chain is also necessarily couched in a series of suprasegmental (paralinguistic or typographical and paratextual) features C, and kinetic or graphic features E that reinforce, refine or modify its meaning. (In face-to-face and written communication, then, the stimulus triggering the comprehension process consists of three components: F, C and E, although the latter one is lost in strictly acoustical communications such as radio, telephone, etc., often making comprehension more difficult.) All the above components are characterised by specific sets of features m, n, etc. 3) The speech act is carried out in a given social situation or sociohistorical field G governed by a shared system of beliefs, norms and practices, or a certain shared life and personal experience P, within a given microworld M, at a historic moment VH, and, within that moment, at a specific time t. (All these components are also characterised by specific sets of features m, n, etc.) 4) A subject of comprehension (interlocutor, observer, or the very speaker engaged in an inner dialogue with himself) listens and understands in a complex mental operation which results in his producing in turn a speech percept comprehended LPC, itself a function of the activation and retroapplication of a representation34 of the same linguistic systems o and knowledge base K. In order to do so, he must resort to or overcome his conscious motivation or resistance U and be governed in turn by an adequate unconscious predisposition to cooperate Z. We should stress the active nature of comprehension, whereby the comprehender (re-)constructs his speech perception of the speaker’s meaning meant retro-applying his own filters U, Z 34

Notice that wile the speaker must activate the linguistic systems proper, the interlocutor can make do with activating a representation thereof. This explains the difference between competence and performance or, more crucially, between active and passive linguistic knowledge. In Umberto Eco’s The Name of the Rose, Salvatore speaks a jumble of the different languages into which Latin had dissolved (“all of them and none,” as Adso explains) which does not stand in the way of Adso’s comprehension - or that of Eco’s intended reader: “Penitenziagite! Vide quando draco venturus est a rodegarla l’anima tua! La mortz est super nos! Prega che vene lo papa santo a liberar nos a malo de todas le peccata!... Bonun monasterium et qui se magna et se priega dominum vostrum. Et el resto valet un figo seco...” (Eco 1980/2000:54). By definition, nobody can actually “know” this non-existent language, all we -speakers of Romance languages- can have is a representation thereof. Of course, Eco cannot mean -nor do I think he does- for his Italian readers to understand everything Salvatore means to say: It is enough for his readers to understand... enough - it is enough for them to understand relevantly. Now how did the English translator, who, unlike Eco, cannot possibly expect his average reader to understand Salvatore, manage? By Anglicising his jargon so as to make it easier for his reader to represent it: “Penitenziagite! Watch out for the draco who cometh in futurum to gnaw your anima! Death is super nos! Pray the Santo Pater come to liberar nos a malo and all our sin!... Bonum monasterium and aquí refectorium and pray to dominum nostrum. And the resto is not worth merda....” (p. 46). As we can see, Salvatore speaks no given language, and yet we can understand him... and translate him into any given language or another non-existent one. 66

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and K to the acoustic/optic stimulus FCE. Comprehension produces, moreover, main and secondary contextual effects Aa (cognitive or qualitative), which, in order for communication not to have failed pragmatically, must correlate somehow to the consciously or unconsciously intended effects. Regardless of its pragmatic felicity, communication will have succeeded in so far as, in a given social situation, identity is achieved between what the speaker wants to convey (LPI) and what the comprehender has understood (LPC) - otherwise it will have failed to a greater or lesser degree. Since neither perception is open to observation, such identity is impossible to verify empirically: it can only be postulated. What is crucial to retain is that, in the end, this identity is a function of the relevant linguistic (LHRQ) and cognitive (KPM) baggage -the hermeneutic package- shared by both parties to an act of speech and of how adequately predisposed they are to communicate with each other (Z). In order to have succeeded pragmatically and, moreover, qualitatively, however, the result of communication must be relevant identity ([=]) between LPI and LPC - i.e. as apt a balance or correlation as necessary -from sufficient to optimum- of identity of meaning and correspondence of contextual effects intended and achieved. It is worth stressing that in expressive -and most especially literary- speech, mutual orientedness entails emotive empathy, a kind of shared emotive package that would be the emotive counterpart of the cognitive hermeneutic package. If this empathy is absent, for instance, the reader will understand the poem but fail to be affected by it in the way the poet presumably intended35. In symbolic notation, the model looks as follows: Do: WZ > Yy > LPIKo → [Fo(XmL,SmH,VmR,JmQ)CmEm]GPMVHtm ↔ UZ > LPCKo → Aa

Where > means “determines,” → means “produces,” and ↔ means “produces by retroprojecting.” At the purely ideational level, communication will have succeeded, then, if: LPIo =LPCo

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Of course, this emotive package can be developed with life experience and the development of the hermeneutic package: poets that we used to like become trivial or awkward, others suddenly reveal themselves to us after years of intermittent readings. © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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With this, an interlocutor merely becomes aware of what a speaker means to say. Pragmatically, on the other hand, communication will have succeeded if, in the specific situation, pragmatic intentions adequately correlate to the contextual effects achieved; i.e. if: Yy=Aa It is worth pointing out that pragmatic intentions govern an LPI, but do not actually produce it, whilst comprehension -i.e. LPC- does produce all contextual effects. In this respect, may I clarify that the same symbol = stands, as the case may be, for identity and adequate correlation between contextual effects pursued and achieved - what, for the sake of brevity, we might call pragmatic correspondence. Globally perfect communication would lie, then, in an optimum correspondence between motivations, interests, intentions and contextual effects coupled to an absolute identity of intended and comprehended sense. As with every human endeavour, of course, perfect communication does not exist: We must make do with a socially relevant degree of success, i.e. with being able to communicate closely enough to this unreachable ideal. In actual reality, what we pursue and normally manage is something both less ambitious and more practical: not total LPIo/LPCo identity and perfect Yy/Aa correspondence, but sufficient identity and acceptable correspondence, in other words, what I call relevant identity between meaning as meant and meaning as comprehended: LPIo[=]LPCo

Obviously, the degree of identity and threshold of acceptability varies for each specific act and, more generally, for each specific type of situation. In this respect, a typology of situations is the real phenomenon behind a typology of texts. Some have claimed that this notion is too “vague.” Far from it: it could not be more specific. The problem lies in that a) it varies each time, and b) in some cases it may prove difficult to establish. As is always the case with social -as opposed to physical- reality, only actual social praxis allows to prove or disprove its existence. Neither I nor the notion are to blame, but the obdurate reality of human communication. Those who demand something more “specific” remind me of the character in Gorki’s The Lower Depths who asserted that a map was useless unless it showed the Land of Justice. The developed sub-model of written communication The model of the written speech act (which can be extrapolated to any speech act where the act of production is separated in time from the act of comprehension) consists of two distinct phases: the act of writing DT and the act(s) of reading DL(n), which can be widely separated in time and space, whereby the different acts of reading take place at different moments and in 68

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sometimes radically different situations. Comprehension is thus scattered across time and space in a constellation of LPCs around a postulated but more often than not inaccessible archetypical LPC (the existence of such an LPC shared by all those who read a “No Smoking” sign is easier to verify than the existence of an LPC shared by all the readers of Hamlet or The Bible). In the first phase, there is no other LPC than that of the writer understanding himself, who, consciously or unconsciously, assumes that the eventual readers will evoke it too. And, of course, he anticipates their reaction - i.e. the effects that comprehension will have on them. In the model of this phase, then, the pole of comprehension - UZ, LPC and Aa- is left out: DTo: WZ > Yy > LPIKo → [Fo(XmL,SmH,VmR,JmQ)CmEm]GTPMVHtm

At the time of writing, the writer assumes that others will relevantly perceive his own LPI, but he does not know it for sure: He lives his own solitary perception of what he means to convey - he is his own and sole interlocutor36. In this respect, writing resembles inner speech, where intention and comprehension interact within the same skull. The lone author of a sonnet, a love letter or a job application both writes and reads, produces an LPI and perceives it as LPC. Such self-comprehension often leaves him dissatisfied and he rushes to modify either Fo or the very LPI. (Each phrase before you, my friend, has jumped the net countless times.) In the second phase the situation is inverted: If in the oral act the interlocutor has before him a real speaker with his meaning meant, in the act of reading the reader is almost invariably bereft of this immediate, “personified,” presence of an LPI and the motivations WZ and intentions Yy that govern it. What is absent now is the pole of intention37. The only thing that is present is the physical support of F, and then not of all of it: just its morphosyntactic XmL and semantic SmH components. The reader finds himself before the isolated chain Fo, and must interpret it often without reference to the original communicative situation or the person who has left it behind - which, by the way, explains the sacralisation of the text: The inaccessible God-author must be interpreted through His Word. Thus, in the model of this phase what is left out is the pole of intention - WZ, Yy and LPIKo. Also absent are prosody V and register J, which, in actual fact, must be inferred (the way we infer them, for instance, from the classical Latin and Greek texts) - even if the writer meant to set them down. 36

Developing Osimo’s (2001 and 2002) concept -derived from Eco- we can say that the “empirical author” posits the existence of a “model reader” whom he tries to impersonate as his own first “empirical reader” (the concepts tally with the “implied” reader and author mentioned by Sousa (2002)). 37

This time around, it is the “empirical reader” who posits the existence of a “model author” whom he tries to impersonate as the “empirical author” who has actually written the text for him, the empirical reader, to read. © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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Only a good reader can, by uttering aloud or mentally, supply prosody and register - but they will always be an interpretation (as in the case of music). We do not know for sure how Shakespeare or Dickens pronounced English: in Australia “I” and “may” rhyme. The reader believes he imagines the voice of Byron or Whitman - but it is just a social (neither optic nor acoustic) illusion of having before him, in the ambiguously silent page, an LPI - except that he is its sole “author”: he imagines him. The reader produces an LPC believing it matches the author’s LPI and strives to infer what the latter’s motives and intentions were, except that, alone as he finds himself before the silent page, in a reading situation at times centuries and oceans apart from the original one, he may miscalculate (in which case, of course, communication fails). Reading, as we see, has also a lot in common with inner speech - except that this time around it is the reader who plays the intention/comprehension game inside his head, imagining himself as the author, meaning to mean (as it is your lot, my overworked friend, this very instant): DLo: [Fo(XmL,SmH)CmEm]GLPMVHtm+n ↔ UZ > LPCKo → Aa

In García Landa’s words, the “existential” separation between DL and DT is due to the technique of writing itself. Graphic signs, imprinted upon matter that can be displaced and reproduced, make possible, nay, inevitable a multitude of acts of reading by the same or different readers. The model of the act of reading will therefore be the sum total of potential individual acts, each by a specific person and in its own situation: DLo1: [Fo(XmL,SmH,VmR,JmQ)CmEm]GL1PMVHtm+n1 ↔ UZ > LPCKo1 → Aa DLo2: [Fo(XmL,SmH,VmR,JmQ)CmEm]GL2PMVHtm+n2 ↔ UZ > LPCKo2 → Aa .................................................................................................................. DLon: [Fo(XmL,SmH,VmR,JmQ)CmEm]GLnPMVHtm+nn ↔ UZ > LPCKon → Aa

As García Landa’s, this model of the reading speech act represents the whole series of possible readings; consequently, the model of the text also ends up being the relationship between these two phases: DTo / DLon

As García Landa puts it, DLn rends apart the presences in either poles of the speech act, removing comprehension further and further in time and space from the specific situation of speech production and creating a new situation beyond “sensorial” time and space - a situation that takes place in a new wavelength. This is the existence modality of history, i.e. of the world(s) in which human life flows. This scission has two sides: the separation of the LPCs produced by different and successive readers, and the separation between GT and GLn (i.e. between the situation where the act of writing took place and the 70

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totality of situations in which take place the different acts of reading). Thus, writing creates a world, whilst the unrecorded oral speech act is but an episode. This explains that as decisive changes occur in the different series of acts of reading, as the precomprehension schemes and other elements of the hermeneutic package and, more generally, the reading-act situation (including the readers’ motivations and resistance which govern the contextual effects) together with language itself (and, most especially the semantic load of lexicon) new translations become necessary - nay, new acts of writing DTin, even intralinguistically (for who could manage Hamlet or Don Quixote with their “dreadful” spelling?38). This multiplicity of readings explains the multiplicity of translations: As the translator himself changes or society evolves, so do different individual or collective readings of the same texts, and with them the individual or collective metarepresentations and effects produced by the LPCos - and, with them, the translators’ LPIis39. This model also applies to recorded oral communication, except that in that case, prosody and, to a lesser extent, register are part of the preserved Fo, as are its paralinguistic and, in the case of recorded images, kinetic configuration. In any event, delayed communication also succeeds if: LPI [=] LPC The perquisites of speech perception Let us take stock of our concepts. In order for communication to be established, we need mutual orientedness – the conscious, but above all unconscious, will to understand despite all subjective and objective obstacles (which can be assimilated to Grice’s principle of co-operation). In order for you to understand me and vice-versa, we need the background of some kinds of shared linguistic and non-linguistic knowledge, experience and whatnot that we may activate as necessary in this specific, nonce act of speech. It is impossible to systematise this knowledge base (I have spoken about a myriad different things) but it is probably stored as a system. First and foremost, you must have some kind of adequate representation of the syntactic and semantic systems that the speaker is activating in order to organise his utterance. In this case it is fairly easy: although I am not a native speaker of English (as you yourself are likely not to be), we both know enough “English” to meet. Still, I am writing in my English as I know it and as I activate it here and now. And you are bringing to bear your English as you know it and can activate it here and now: At the two basic levels, I have more trouble with 38

As a matter of fact, the same book is often published at either side of the Atlantic with its spelling respectively adapted to the British and American use. 39

Naturally, this applies to speech in general and also to interpretation, but it is in written translation that it appears more obviously. © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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syntax than with lexicon: my non-nativeness will show more markedly on the axis of combination than on that of selection. But this linguistic utterance is also articulated according to my practical knowledge of prosody and register. In all, I am applying concomitantly four distinct systems: (phono)morphosyntactic, semantic, prosodic and register that I have somehow stored in long-term memory. Insofar as you share them or, at least, can come up with an adequate representation of them -you do not have to know Japanese in order to understand “Japglish”- you can understand my Fo. (My utterance, by the way, is graphically and typographically “configured” – that, too, is part of the stimulus you are processing.) Besides activating your relevant knowledge or representation of the linguistic systems that I am applying, you will have activated and brought to bear a whole series of encyclopaedic entries, the residue of countless acts of written and oral speech that you have participated in, as sieved by your acumen and sensitivity, which will have helped you put together the many twos that speech communication cannot but leave dangling apart. What you understand of this book so far is thus the vector resulting from what I am saying to you and what you know and activate (as enhanced or hampered by your intelligence and emotional predisposition or resistance to understand it). You do not approach this book, then, in a desert, but accommodate it more or less in your mental library, complementing, refuting, enriching or impoverishing other books, where it will patiently wait to be in turn complemented, refuted, impoverished or enriched by other books to come. In that virtual library that is your long-term memory, where books appear or vanish in a mysterious, nay, capricious way, conjured up or down by everyday experience, there are ones you like and others you do not, that have marked you for better of for worse. Your understanding of this one will largely depend on those that wake up to receive it or reject it... No; it is not, in fact, a library: it is a vast marmite of cognitive and emotive experiences, of all of your past social practice. That’s why it is better to think not in terms of books and libraries, but of acts of speech and memories of acts of speech, and most especially of the metarepresentations they have triggered. Because this book, as the Odyssey and your driver’s license or the Constitution of the United States of America, is but an act of speech, whose production and comprehension is governed by the same principles that govern the production and comprehension of every single act of speech. This memory of past speech acts, however, is not enough. Every act of speech is produced and culminates in a specific situation. For you, it is this instant and this place, whereupon gravitate two crucial series of factors: On the one hand, a whole system of beliefs, mores, habits and, generally speaking, social practices that you share with other members of your social class, your age group, your community, your trade, etc. – that which we could call “culture,” Searle (1995) calls “background,” and I define as the ensemble of social filters that facilitate or hamper, enhance or distort the mutual production of speech 72

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percepts between subjects and their further processing into and storage as metarepresentations. And then there is a tighter circle of beliefs, mores, habits, social practices and specific knowledge that specifically affect this particular act of speech, what García Landa calls mundillo, and I call microworld in English – the specific world in which a specific speech act takes place, which can be highly structured, as at a United Nations meeting or a family dinner, or barely so, as with a chance encounter in the street. (By definition, the presence of even a nonprofessional mediator exerts a strong structuring pressure even on the most loosely structured situations – a fact that deserves more attention than I can give it here; see also Roy (2000).) García Landa warns that this neat terminological distinction between general knowledge, social practices and microworld is but an artifice imposed by the need to segment an intractable totality into more or less graspable parts: they should not be interpreted at all as tight compartments. It matters little, in the end, where we place, say, the philosophical entries that we have activated in the hermeneutic process at hand – what does matter is that unless you activate them too, you cannot understand the relevant aspects of my meaning. The point is that the knowledge that you bring to bear as you read is there, virtually present all the time, and is constantly turned on and off, a bit like the orbit of the Earth, which only materialises at a specific point each time. The same applies to the social practices gravitating upon us now. This act of written speech strays quite afar from established conventions in the field. If my transgression of the relevant socio-textual practices ruffles your feathers the wrong way, you will have to make an additional effort to understand me despite your irritation. If, on the other hand, you do not mind my chatty, rambling style, you may feel more comfortable and understanding will be more lubricated40. Whatever your personal reaction, the sheer fact that this act of speech transgresses the social practices gravitating upon it reveals their very existence. As a matter of fact, those practices tend to become apparent only when they are strained - the same way relevant linguistic and non-linguistic knowledge shines forth most powerfully when it is lacking. Also, this second, this hour, this day or this week are but a link in the history of mankind - they are the product of a history that has made possible, as a case in point, books on translation theory in English, that has allowed the confluence of García Landa’s model of speech with a Marxian view of society and matter and a Freudian concept of the subjective individual. In successive historic moments, the development of knowledge and social praxis will make other men understand differently: Not a different thing, I hope –my meaning meant will not have changed– but the same thing in a different way, as a 40

Among those who have read this and other pieces, students have liked my colloquial style more than scholars, who have criticised it harshly (and understandably, since they could do with a fourth of the words I write). © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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function of different hermeneutic arsenals, of new memories of speech acts yet to happen. May I recall once again that García Landa calls the totality of the virtual systems gravitating upon a speech act the exponential field, and the knowledge of it that is necessary in order for comprehension to succeed - the hermeneutic package. Its application, I add, must be governed by a shared emotive package an unconscious disposition to make oneself understood and to understand: if this unconscious disposition is lacking at either of the poles, communication cannot succeed, since it is simply the unconscious (and, therefore, consciously intractable) refusal adequately to apply the hermeneutic package. Virtuality and acts García Landa explains that, in order to understand the hermeneutic package we must take a closer look at another decisive aspect of speech production and comprehension: the ontological difference between human actions and the virtual systems that gravitate upon them and determine their organisation. In his formal model, he symbolises virtualities as exponents and events as mantissas, which I find most illuminating. García Landa thus dialectically overcomes the tug-of-war between structuralism and existentialism – no mean philosophical feat for a theory of translation! And he goes further: he boldly explains that language (i.e. langage, our second-degree perceptual system) acts as the virtual spectacles through which we perceive our world41. Without language we could not perceive anything but our present environment: we could not “see” the past or the future, or other presents, or unicorns or numbers or literary heroes or translation theories. The linguistic systems that we have internalised govern our perception of human life. In any event, let me finish off this section by stressing that languages do not really exist – what we call languages, dialects, sociolects and whatnot are but a statistical abstraction of countless individual speech acts by countless individual people at specific times and places. I will venture one uneducated step into the minefield and suggest that what we call, say, the English language is but a statistically significant and never total coincidence in the associative neuronal processes that govern speech production and comprehension, including the muscular commands to the relevant organs, for specific social groups at a specific time (I may be wrong, but it rings very plausible to my admittedly meagre hermeneutic package42).

41

Reiss and Vermeer (1996:20-21) speak of all manner of lenses of different curvature: conventions, individual attitude, possible worlds, traditions and values, but they forget the fundamental one - speech itself, which makes all other possible. 42

I am more convinced by the connexionist model propounded by Lamb (1998) than by the computational notion advocated by Pinker (1997). 74

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Speech is larger than language The computer in James Bond’s BMW appears to “speak,” but it does not speak or say anything. To speak (in both its guises, since understanding is also speaking) is to avail ourselves of our second signal-system in order to produce speech perceptions. To speak is a semiotic Gestalt that writing tends, unfortunately, to mask. We speak also with our face and our body, and, besides, with the “rest” of our voice: with our pauses, our pitch, our tone and everything that we produce that does not come from the linguistic systems that we are applying (the impoverished optic counterparts of which are fonts, paragraphs, titles, illustrations, layout and everything that, again, is not part of the linguistic systems applied but goes “with” the graphic utterance). This is essential, because these stimuli are, as it were, part of the explicature. The underrated importance of the graphic and typographic or paratextual configuration Let me take, as an example, Douglas Hofstadter’s Le Ton beau de Marot. In Praise of the Music of Language. Clement Marot was a XVIth century Provençal poet, an aventurier and bon vivant who, among other things, wrote a little poem, A une demoyselle malade, the multiple translation of which is the pretext for the book. Let me stay with the title: Once the LPI has been understood, you may have asked yourself as I did (and Hofstadter means us to) why half the title in French and half in English; i.e. why an Fo/i? Why, indeed, such a strange capitalisation? Why not either Le Ton Beau de Marot, following the English convention, or Le ton beau de Marot, following the Gallic one? The French title Le Ton beau de Marot (Marot’s beautiful sound) is but a possible graphy of the phonic chain /letombòdmaró/, which can also be written out as Le Tombeau de Marot - Marot’s grave. Since the phonic ambiguity cannot be reproduced in English, Hofstadter leaves the title in French, with a capitalisation that will help put “Ton” and “beau” together. Since he calculates that not all his readers know French and that many who do will not perceive the ambiguity (comprehension is, after all, automatic), he explains it: If you know no French or had not perceived the pun, my reader, now you have the necessary hermeneutic tools to achieve LPI[=]LPC. The second half of the title foretells the subject matter to come: language as a musical rather than semantic instrument of thought. The cover, by the way, helps resolve the double entendre: Under the title, Le Ton beau de Marot. In Praise of the Music of Language, there is a large burial cross in which the poem can be read and, below, the inscription: “C.M. 1496-1544.” As will be the case with Perec’s La disparition, which I will analyse in thelast chapter, this “text” is a symbiotic stimulus where F, C and E form a semiotic totality each of them contributing to a relevant verbalisation of the LPI. This, of course, is much more glaringly obvious in illustrated advertisements and in so many instances of multimedia translation. Which is why I find it extremely useful to have all three elements explicitly incorporated © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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in a model of communication and, therefore, translation - especially now that the translator must also be a proficient desktop publisher, let alone producer of multimedia texts. A more precise distinction between meaning and sense, context and situation Let us take a closer look at these two pairs of notions. In specialised literature the crucial distinction is ever more often made between linguistic meaning and intended sense understood as the substantive propositional content of a message - the LPI. Although the concepts overlap, it is convenient not to confuse the distinction between linguistic meaning and extralinguistic sense with that between explicature and implicature. Implicatures arise more or less spontaneously out of a given situation. If the lights are out, the explicature “lights, please!” produces the implicature “[turn on the] lights”; if the lights are on, the opposite implicature is inferred. Sense, as we shall see, is much larger and more complex a notion. What has traditionally been called sense can be defined grosso modo as the vector resulting from the linguistic meaning of the message and the speaker’s communicative intention within the specific speech situation. Of these three factors, the first is the only relatively non-controversial one; the second is already more complex (what about the unconscious intention? and what about the lapsus linguae, the betrayal of a conscious intention?); while the third encompasses everything besides the utterance itself, including, at times, the speaker’s very intention. In order to name it, the term usually resorted to is that jack-of-all-trades “context,” which, to boot, also covers the purely linguistic surroundings. So if the conceptual and terminological distinction between meaning and sense is already established (though, unfortunately, not enough), there still prevails in literature an indiscriminate use of “context” and “situation.” The first one to distinguish terminologically linguistic context from extralinguistic situation, to my knowledge, is Catford (1969), who calls them respectively “co-text” and “context.” Catford is among the first clearly to understand that translation cannot be the sheer mechanical substitution of linguistic units: Two utterances, he tells us, are equivalent when they are interchangeable in the same situation. He illustrates this point through his famous example “Ja prishla”/”I have come,” where the array of semes and morphemes relevant in Russian and English to describe the same event coincides only partially. For Catford, however, the same situation seems to be an iterated identical event: every time a woman has come on foot she will say ‘Ja prishlá’ in Russian, and ‘I have come’ in English. Of course, things are not that simple. What matters are not the features chosen by languages but those selected by speakers, i.e. those features intentionally expressed or left implicit taking

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advantage of a specific language’s freedoms and bowing to its servitudes (Vinay 1980)43.) Almost twenty years later, two books appear simultaneously that do indeed elaborate the distinction: Neubert (1985) and Lvovskaya (1985, with an updated Spanish version in 1997). Neubert describes the situation as a series of concentric circles going further away from the text into culture. Among the many outstanding insights in this work is the concept of the linguistic framing of the situation. Russian and English speakers frame differently Catford’s situation (the naturalness of framing -i.e. idiomaticity- becomes, thus one of the fundamental criteria of translation quality.) Lvovskaya explains the text’s sensic structure as a hierarchical function of a) what she calls the speech situation (whose formants are who, to whom, why, what for, how, where, and when) - the product of the interaction of the speaker’s persona (lichnost/personalidad) and the relevant circumstances of communication, which motivates the speaker’s specific linguistic behaviour and the means of its realisation; b) the text’s pragmatic substructure - the internal programme of linguistic behaviour, formed in the speaker’s conscience under the influence of the speech situation, which appears as a series of communicative tasks subject to a main task and to the logic of speech development; and c) the semantic substructure - the objectual, conceptual and linguistic content of a text, its context, and, at the same time, the linguistic form of the realisation of the speaker’s communicative intention. Lvovskaya’s scheme is the only systematic attempt at analysing the situation I know of, although she does so in the narrow sense just described. Two basic criticisms come to mind: To begin with, in the semantic substructure, Lvovskaya mixes qualitatively dissimilar elements - one thing is the objectual reference, another its conceptualisation (both extra-linguistic), and quite another the way they are both assigned linguistic meaning. But what interests me for my present purposes is that between the speaker’s persona and his communicative intention, extra-linguistic context, and culture (which Lvovskaya leaves out), there remains around the utterance too wide a territory for us to make do with the simple categories of sense and situation. May I now proceed to suggest a draft classification of the space around an utterance with its relevant terminology. An utterance Keep in mind the following example: A group of ten-year old children are playing around a swimming pool. When it comes to go into the water, little Peter 43

When the world was bi-polar, “underdeveloping” countries demanded “the new world economic order” (in which the wealthy would be less all-powerful), whilst the developed nations were only willing to consent to “a new world order” (anyone except the one demanded by the underdeveloped). The then Soviet Union washed off her hands blissfully: Since in Russian there is no article, her delegates always spoke simply of “new world economic order.” © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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excuses himself saying “They won’t let me.” We will analyse exclusively the linguistic stimulus, leaving aside its paralinguistic and kinetic configuration. This side of the utterance The speaker’s persona Every act of speech is, undoubtedly, the work of a persona, single or collective - a synthesis of the speaker’s psychological, intellectual, and social background and experience, which influences or determines his linguistic behaviour, i.e. the form and content of the utterance, plus the sheer fact that he chooses to proffer it. The model does not explicitly incorporate the speaker’s persona, just his motivations and intentions, but nothing prevents us from bringing it in explicitly if the need arises. In our example, we are dealing with an insecure child. The speaker’s pragmatic intention and conscious and unconscious motivations The intersection of the persona of the speaker (who can be the originator or the utterer proper) and the need, or conscious or unconscious wish to make verbally manifest something to someone is synthesised in the utterance - the linguistically framed materialisation of an LPI and a main and a constellation of secondary pragmatic intentions governed by a conscious and an unconscious motivations. Again, it can be the intention of a specific speaker —a historically, socially and psychologically conditioned persona— or that of a similarly conditioned but de-personalised originator, often expressed through an anonymous and irrelevant author, as is the case with most pragmatic texts. But let it be clear that, even when we can no longer think of an individual speaker, behind the text there is always the State, a social group, interests that produce it or command its production. The motivation may be varied: to communicate true or false information to, to show to or hide from, or to create a genuine or misleading impression in a specific individual or collective interlocutor. This interlocutor can be real or imaginary, or even the very speaker in a dialogue with himself44. I have distinguished conscious from unconscious motivation because they are often at odds. The individual or collective psychology of the speaker (whether unfolded into originator and utterer or not) also governs the tactical and strategic calculation of what to say to whom when and how. Besides, such decision is realised according to the speaker’s rhetorical and linguistic competence, itself a part of the wider competence required to produce meaningful discourse.

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Indeed, even in inner speech do conscious and unconscious motivations and pragmatic intentions intervene: Think of the heated private argument preceding any important decision, from demanding a salary increase to deciding what number we are going to bet on at the roulette table. 78

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A pragmatic intention is, thus, the communicative intention where conscious and unconscious motivations converge. With the development of discourse the intention may indeed change, but we can posit that it is always prior to the utterance. This applies even to hesitations and phatic fillers, which, as is known, are due most of the time to the unconscious intention to keep the communication channel open. In our example, we have child who is afraid of getting into the pool (and does not know why), who wants to get off the hook and lies in order not to loose face. The speaker’s direct intended sense (LPI) Prior to the utterance, there is, then, a persona who out of conscious and unconscious motivations comes up with a pragmatic intention that leads him to initiate a speech act. Such intention materialises through a direct intended sense, the equivalent of Lvovskaya’s communicative task - that which the speaker wishes to say officially –including, and here I add to García Landa’s concept, the immediate secondary perlocutionary effects he consciously intends to produce– in order to produce the desired pragmatic effect. Such intended sense is a synthesis of intentions, thought and speech that manifests itself as a perception - an LPI45. Let me stress that intended sense, pragmatic intention and motivation are different things. General Motors extol the virtues of their new model (direct intended sense), in order to induce the interlocutor to buy it (pragmatic intention), so as to increase profits (motivation). GM do not say -or imply- ‘Out with your money!’ If they show their cards, their intention fails, even if the intended sense is impeccably framed linguistically. That is why we can assert that in order for communication to succeed metacommunicatively, it may be unadvisable or even self-defeating for the interlocutor to grasp the speaker’s true conscious or unconscious motivation. It would be the case of a physician mendaciously soothing the child patient before a painful procedure, or of a husband who feigns having forgotten about their wedding anniversary in order later to surprise his wife with a beautiful present: It is “good” both for physician and child, and for husband and wife that the speaker’s true motivations and intentions remain hidden from the interlocutor. As with the intention, we can also distinguish a main direct intended sense - equivalent to discourse analysis’s macro-proposition, and a series of secondary directly intended senses, corelatable to propositions. The interaction between pragmatic intention and direct intended sense governs both a text’s functionality and the organisation of the themes and rhemes - i.e. the articulation of logical subjects and predicates, or the distribution of an utterance’s informative load. 45

Resorting to Allwood’s (1996:60 and foll.) model, we can say that direct intended sense is signalled by the speaker, i.e. the speaker intends to make manifest that he is displaying something. © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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In our example, the LPI automatically inferred from F “They won’t let me” is [I cannot get into the water because my parents have told me not to]. Uttered in a different situation, this F might be interpreted as the vehicle of a different intended sense. The speaker’s indirect intended sense We can further distinguish an indirect intended sense (to which direct intended sense is pragmatically subject). Indirect intended sense is a metarepresentation that the speaker intends (or hopes) to induce in his interlocutor on the basis of his LPI - the archetypical case is allegory46. In other words, the LPI has a certain perlocutionary purpose. The speaker is counting on his interlocutor making the necessary inferences in order to proceed, in Peircean terms, to a second semiosis, taking direct intended sense as an index of indirect intended sense. An interlocutor, however, can understand the latter without grasping the former: More than any other, literary speech comprehension demands such ability to metarepresent. Identity between indirect intended and comprehended sense is, therefore, a much more problematic problem, witness the many conflicting interpretations of the “meaning” of so many literary pieces. For the sake of simplicity, I have not introduced the distinction in the model, but, again, nothing prevents it. In any event, indirect sense, as all other metarepresentations, is part of the contextual effects of LPI comprehension. In our example, indirect intended sense would be [It is not that I am afraid, on the contrary, I’d love to]. At the utterance The utterance’s objective meaning It is desirable to distinguish direct intended sense from objective meaning - the meaning –including usual secondary perlocutionary effects and subsequently triggered metarepresentations– that the utterance would normally be attributed in the specific situation (which often –but not necessarily– would be its literal interpretation), or the interpretation the bulk of the subjects of comprehension (whether or not intended interlocutors) would give it “out of context,” as it were, i.e. in a typical situation, independently of the speaker’s intention. Although they usually coincide, direct intended sense and objective meaning should not be confused. The allegorical sense of a literary piece, superimposed upon its direct intended sense, is interpreted on the basis of the latter: The author resorts intentionally to direct intended sense in order to express the indirect one. Objective meaning, let us remind ourselves, is independent from the speaker’s intention (even if he may consciously take advantage of it)47 - it is, in a manner 46

Allwood would say that the speaker is simply displaying indirect intended sense.

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Milos Forman’s The Firemen’s Ball used an incompetent fire brigade as an allegory for Czechoslovakia’s Stalinist leaders. That allegorical sense, though, was so successfully masked that neither the country’s bureaucrats nor her firemen understood it: The censure let 80

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of speaking, the “default” sense that a given linguistic chain would be perceived as making to the majority of speakers in a specific situation. It often happens that a speaker denies the hidden intentions attributed to him by an interlocutor and swears that he never meant to imply anything more than he has said: ‘No, it is not that I do not wish to go out: I just remarked that it is raining.’ In purely informative texts, objective meaning and intended (direct and indirect) sense tend to coincide. The speaker, that is, does not pursue any ulterior perlocutionary effects, which simplifies interpretation: he simply means exactly what he says. If it coincides with his LPI (i.e. if intended sense = objective meaning), communication unfolds unencumbered. It is, I hope, the case with this piece, before which the reader (at least the contemporary one) does not need to infer too much in order to go from what I have said to what I mean him to understand. But even in such instances, the cultural and situational displacement specific to writing and mediation often provokes fissures between the two. The discrepancies between direct intended sense and objective meaning are usually due to three series of factors: an intended sense incompetently framed by the speaker, insufficient sophistication on the part of the interlocutor48, or a decisive change in one or more of the formants in the second speech situation, so that if in the original situation both direct intended sense and objective meaning match, they no longer do in the new one, and since the original situation becomes inaccessible, the text is interpreted exclusively on the basis of the second one49. This is often the case with written translation, where the direct intended sense can remain elusive, forcing the translator –as any other contemporary reader– to enrich ad hoc his hermeneutic package by resorting to philological, historic, literary and other most variegated kinds of substantive and ancillary knowledge in order to transcend an utterance’s objective meaning and get to the “author’s” meaning. The first case can be trivially illustrated: Many grandmothers mistake the names of their children and grandchildren. Sometimes it is clear whom they are referring to; at other times, the interlocutor has no way of knowing that Peter is not Peter but John. There has been a short circuit between the LPI and its verbalisation: granny means “John,” but utters “Peter.” So that although the film slip through... and the fire-fighters protested against what they took to be an uncalled for and appalling portrayal. Both mistook objective meaning for indirect intended sense. 48

As was the case with Forman’s Stalinist and fire-fighting audiences, neither of which, incidentally, were the film’s intended addressees. 49

When asked by his translator, Norman Thomas DiGiovanni, what he meant by a certain metaphor in one of his early poems, Borges could no longer remember - the situation having changed, his own indirect intended sense escaped him, and was no longer accessible through objective meaning. In that same interview, by the way, my great compatriot advised DiGiovanni not to translate what he had written but what he had meant, thus both distinguishing between intended sense and objective and literal meaning, and giving primacy to the former. © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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intended sense may be, say, ‘My son has called me’ the objective meaning is ‘My grandson has called me.’ Neither should we mistake objective meaning as rightly understood by an interlocutor with intended sense misunderstood due to the interlocutor’s own mistake or incompetence. (In a delicate situation, even the best interpreter lets go of intended sense and treads carefully sticking to objective meaning. The bad ones do not even know that there may be a difference and that their work is, first and foremost, to distinguish them - and then to decide in all responsibility which one to reproduce, which normally is the directly intended one50: In other words, the default object of reverbalisation ought to be always intended sense, to be superseded in exceptional circumstances rather than the other way round – exactly as it happens in everyday life.) In our example, the objective meaning is, simply [I am not allowed]. The utterance’s literal meaning As pointed out above, objective meaning should not be equated with literal meaning - the literal interpretation of the utterance’s linguistic meaning, without considering the relevant contextual factors. One of children’s most endearing qualities is their inability to go beyond literal meaning and mistaking it for intended sense (for them, literal meaning is objective - and therefore intended). In the homonymous film, retarded Forrest Gump is the only one in all the American army to believe that they are in the Viet-Nam jungle looking for a guy called Charlie (which, as the less young ones among us know, is how the American GI’s called the Viet-Cong fighters). As a case in point, despite managing to discover literal meanings that few humans could have perceived, the objective meaning of “time flies like an arrow” -which is metaphorical- was precisely the one the computer could not grasp. Here we can see clearly the ontological difference between objective and literal meaning, since none of the specialist could discern all those possible literal meanings! With literal meaning we exit communication on the lower end into the impersonal realm of la langue. We are no longer speaking of sense (of the verbalisation and comprehension of an LP or of a communicative intention) but exclusively of linguistic meanings, of semantics, of non-intentional abstractions (and fie the translator who clings to this flotsam when comprehension sinks!). In our example, there are at least two possible literal meanings: [My parents won’t allow me] and [My parents won’t lease me]. The utterance’s deep meaning Let us add a category indispensable, for instance, with a view to the psychoanalytic interpretation of an utterance: deep meaning –including all nonconsciously intentional perlocutionary effects– which comes from the 50

Reproducing objective, or even literal, meaning may be a sweet instrument of revenge (see Robinson 1991) rather than of prudence. 82

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unconscious and often has nothing to do with either intended sense or objective meaning and is accessed only via a meta-metarepresentation (i.e. via a thirddegree semiosis)51. Melville swore that Moby Dick had no allegorical sense; if he did sincerely believe so, we do not52. It is known, besides, that detectives and psychotherapists are more after deep meaning - that which the speaker does not consciously mean to convey, or even wishes to hide. Deep meaning is the last layer of the textual onion I shall peel away. With it my analysis exits communication on the upper end into the black box of the human psyche, whence every human action –including every utterance– comes. So deep meaning is unconsciously transmitted by the speaker; intended sense (direct and indirect) is the result of his conscious intention; objective meaning is the neutral ground between speaker and interlocutor; and literal meaning is the sheer skimming of the utterance’s linguistic surface without attention to the extra-linguistic factors. Direct intended sense, objective meaning and, less often, literal meaning are mostly perceived directly, whilst indirect intended sense and deep meaning are always the product of a metarepresentation. And so is, paradoxically, literal meaning (none of the linguists could perceive all the possible literal meanings of “time flies like an arrow,” and it took me quite some time to come up with another literal sense of “My parents won’t let me”). To a great extent, in pragmatic texts -viz. scientific articles without a polemic intention- intended sense and objective meaning match. Literal meaning, on its part, can be disregarded in the certainty that any sophisticated reader will be able to tell when he is to take any utterance literally; whilst deep meaning becomes all but irrelevant. (It would be wrong, however, to assume that collective and anonymous pragmatic texts lack deep meaning, witness the class, racist, or sexist content of so many advertisements.) In a legal text such as Security Council Resolution 24253, however, where the suspect interlocutor must be denied all alibis, literal meaning becomes of the essence. 51

In Allwood’s terms, deep meaning is neither displayed or signalled by the speaker but merely indicated, i.e. conveyed without actually intending to.

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On the other hand, if Melville was lying, and he did indeed have the conscious intention to write an allegory, then the allegorical sense would have been intended. In any case, I do not think that Sophocles was aware of his Oedipus’s complex - or, for that matter, his own. In his Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State, Engels quotes an extremely interesting interpretation of Aeschylus’s Eumenides as the triumph of patriarchal over matriarchal society, which could not possibly have been consciously intended by the playwright. 53

See the controversy around the definite article in the French version -nobody cared about the Spanish- of Security Council Resolution 242, which in English calls upon Israel to withdraw “from occupied territories”, which can be interpreted hypotetically, and in French “des territories occupés”, which implies that they indeed exist. Of course, everybody knew what territories it was all about, so there was no misunderstanding. The French text (passed at the same time as the English one) says what it is said in French to say what the collective speaker means to say, as does, of course, the English one. The greater indeterminancy of the English version is a fact of language, not of speech. The French definite article (as its Spanish © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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In our example, deep meaning would be [I am afraid, but I don’t want to lose face by admitting it]. Around the utterance The linguistic context And so the speaker produces his utterance or text depending on his persona, motivations, and pragmatic intentions, and on the foreseen interlocutor and his reaction; and according to his own specific communicative and linguistic ability. The result is a linear utterance, the different units of which acquire a linguistic life of their own in the chain, within a linguistic context that specifies their semantic and syntactic meaning. (Thus, for instance, in the sentence above “result” is grammatically interpreted as a noun rather than as a verb, while “specifies” is semantically interpreted as a synonym of “makes specific” rather than of “prescribes54.”) In our example, it is the linguistic context that allows us to interpret “let” as the infinitive rather than the past tense of the verb. The extra-linguistic context All the rest -the intonation and gestures that go with orality, the illustrations and graphic layout specific to written texts- is what we could call extra-linguistic context, which, as the linguistic one, does normally help decisively the interpretation of sense and the different layers of meaning. I basically distinguish two components: paralinguistic or suprasegmental, i.e. intonation or its typographical equivalent - which is inseparably incorporated into the utterance, and perilinguistic, i.e. kinetics and illustrations or layout - which is added on to it. A colleague comes to mind who, by dint of sheer language, had to translate the catalogue of a photo exhibition from Russian into Spanish. One of the pictures was called Djévushka s Ljéjkoj, i.e. Girl With Watering Can... though maybe With Camera (i.e. with a Leika); or, for that matter, the beginning of Le petit prince, in which instead of a minute description of his hero, St. Exupéry shows us the drawing he says he made afterwards. The text of the catalogue, and up to a point that of the novel, are almost at the mercy of their graphic context55.

equivalent) is but a servitude. The alleged controversy, as with all legalistic tug of war, is in bad faith, typical of the cases where the Gricean maxim of cooperation falls overboard. 54 Rouchota and Jucker (1998) analyse the way people semantically interpret utterances on the basis of relevance. Without minimising this kind of study, I think that a speaker’s semantic projection upon the linguistic stimulus is almost always automatic, unconscious. From the standpoint of speech production, comprehension and, in the case of translation, re-production, this kind of exercise is at best ancillary. 55

Oittinen (2001) makes an excellent analysis of the importance of the interrelationship between text and images in translating books for children. Kruger (2001), De Linde and Kay 84

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In our example, it is the extralinguistic context that allows us to infer that “won’t let me” refers to getting into the pool. The speech act’s setting Text and context are moreover situated within a setting in which the time/space/person coordinates take shape - the immediate where, when, and who; it is the framework of the anaphoric and cataphoric relations, so indispensable for the interpreter or the film subtitler, since deictics can save a lot of syllables. In our example, the setting is the garden where the children are playing. The speech act’s circumstances Such setting is nothing but the theatre where the circumstances intervene - the wider who, to whom, wherefore, why, where, and when. Circumstances are the immediate causes and effects of live, or, at least real-time communication (news items, media reports, ads, and all nonce literature.) Let me explain why I distinguish wherefore from why. The latter is the essential motivation: GM advertise because they want to sell; but the wherefore of this ad for this model of this year is, precisely, that there is a new model this year, and the ad (as well as its linguistic/graphic form and that of its campaign) is due to an ad hoc calculation. The wherefore is always an immediate reaction to the other circumstances of speech. As in García Landa’s model, setting and circumstances are conflated into the situation, but, as I have just done here, they can be distinguished if necessary. In our example, it is circumstances that force Peter to look for an excuse. The relevant encyclopaedic base Speaker and interlocutor communicate and understand by activating their relevant encyclopaedic base -chunks of their knowledge of the world- which enables, on the one hand, the crystallisation of intended sense into an utterance, and, on the other, the synapse of sense in the mind of the interlocutor - that click with which the more or less discrete units in the linguistic chain are interpreted at given intervals as a unit of sense (i.e. an LPI); i.e. the blossoming of speech perception into directly comprehended sense. The accessibility, associability, and recallability of the information needed to produce and comprehend sense always depend on the interlocutors’ relevant encyclopaedic base (as well as on their intelligence and sensitivity - a decisive couple of formants indeed!). Communication becomes easier and more efficient the greater the shared knowledge and, even more so, when shared knowledge is known to be shared (Neubert 1985), as is, I presume, our case. Even so, there are spheres that individually escape some of us: I have referred to the utterance’s theme-rheme organisation and the synapse of sense without being certain that all of my (1999), Gottlieb (1992) and Guardini (1998), among others, make a similar analysis with respect to subtitling. © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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readers would know what they are, trying to explain it so as not to offend those who do or those who do not. Psychoanalysis and Marxism have also crept in. The usual generalisations, typical of every translation, are but an attempt at reducing the encyclopaedic base to a more manageable scope (i.e. at increasing the general to specific knowledge ratio), thus optimising the ergonomy of discourse-processing by the interlocutor, i.e. relevance. Communication, let us remember, works inferentially and becomes more efficient as the linguistic, paralinguistic and perilinguistic stimulus leads more directly to the relevant implicatures and other metarepresentations. In our example, both Peter and his friends activate chunks of knowledge that allow them to disregard the different literal meanings, enrich objective meaning and infer that those who allegedly have forbidden Peter to go into the water are his parents. The microworld Besides the general knowledge that is activated for the production and comprehension of intended sense, there are situation-specific precomprehension schemes and social practices that become the hallmark of an act of speech. It is what García Landa calls “mundillo” and I have translated as microworld. In our case, we have everything specifically connected to translation theory and practice - that which would interest anybody who buys a book on translation theory, plus the relevant conventions governing this kind of publication. Fillmore’s scenes, frames and scenarios, specific to a speech act setting and circumstances, all contribute to constituting the microworld. In our case, the microworld is that of a group of children who have got together to play in a garden on a summer afternoon. Culture Lastly, both the speaker and, of course, his text are the product, reflection and part of a culture, defined broadly as the receptacle of the social group’s experience - the historically conditioned values, knowledge, habits, tastes, affections through which each interlocutor filters what he says and what he hears. Needless to say, the interlocutor may belong to a different culture (as is systematically the case with a translation’s addressees). Culture, naturally, is in turn a complex category; it varies with nationality, age, sex, sexual orientation, profession, class provenance, ideology, time, and numberless other factors that to a larger or lesser extent influence every act of speech production and comprehension. As in García Landa’s model, these aspects are subsumed in the exponent P, but, as here, they can be further detailed. It is impossible -and unnecessary- to rend apart with a scalpel the encyclopaedic knowledge base from that of the microworld that render comprehension possible (or from the culture that filters it). García Landa uses these two categories because the general precomprehension schemes are not microworld-specific, whilst each microworld activates certain specific spheres, 86

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different from those activated by other microworlds. At a meeting, for instance, an interpreter participates basically in two partially overlapping microworlds: that of the meeting proper (subject, procedures, etc.), which he shares with his interlocutors, but in which he is, in fact, a parvenu, and that of simultaneous interpreting (his colleagues, the booth, the client, etc.) A sign chain, by functioning within the ensemble of activities and relationships in the speech act’s exponential field, on its part, can modify, recreate or newly invent the different levels. Each character in any novel has its own persona and intention, and is placed within its specific setting, circumstances, microworld, and culture. In our example, it is specific to Western petite bourgeois culture for children to play unattended around a private swimming pool and for parents to forbid them to get into the water – as it is for young children to be already aware of the need to save face. That side of the utterance The interlocutor’s persona Every act of speech is addressed to a (or culminates in the comprehension by an un-addressed) persona, single or collective - a synthesis of the interlocutor’s psychological, intellectual, and social background and experience, which influences or determines his linguistic behaviour, i.e. the form and content of his comprehension and the effects that it has upon him. Again, the model does not explicitly bring in the interlocutor’s persona, just his motivations and intentions, plus the effects of comprehension, but nothing prevents us from incorporating it explicitly if the need arises. In our example, we have a most probably homogeneous group of children looking for ways to have fun. The interlocutor’s acceptability criteria The intersection of the interlocutor’s persona and his need, or conscious or unconscious wish or resistance to understand something from someone is synthesised in his acceptability criteria. It can be the criteria of a specific interlocutor -a historically, socially, and psychologically conditioned persona- or that of a similarly conditioned but de-personalised “institution,” often materialised in an anonymous and irrelevant addressee (viz. the secretary taking a message for his boss). But let it be clear that even when we can no longer think of an individual interlocutor, behind individual comprehension there is always the State, a social group, interests that comprehend or command comprehension. The motivation to comprehend may be varied: to learn true or false information, to show or hide interest, to enjoy, to be entertained, etc. I have distinguished conscious from unconscious motivation because they are often at odds. The individual or collective psychology of the interlocutor (whether unfolded into institution and addressee or not) also governs the tactical and strategic calculation of what attitude to adopt when and how. Besides, such © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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comprehension is produced according to the interlocutor’s rhetorical and linguistic competence, itself a part of the wider competence required to understand meaningful discourse. Acceptability criteria are thus where conscious and unconscious motivations and/or resistance converge. With the development of discourse these criteria may indeed change, but we can posit that they are always prior to comprehension. In our example, most of the children will be more or less ready to believe the excuse, or, at least to accept it. Their reaction will depend on how they take it. Sense as comprehended by the interlocutor So far I have referred to sense as intended by the speaker and somehow present on its own in his mind, and to meaning as if it was in the text itself (which, let me repeat, is but an illusion on the part of the subject of comprehension). At the other side of the utterance comes comprehended sense - that which the interlocutor infers from the text, his interpretation of literal and objective meaning, direct and indirect intended sense, and deep meaning. The different degrees of comprehension depend greatly on the interlocutor’s persona (including his intelligence, knowledge, interests and sensitivity), in a way roughly mirroring the speaker’s. Between the two subjective extremes, which are what the speaker wishes to convey and what the interlocutor grasps, we have the objective aspects of communication, including, but not limited to, the utterance’s linguistic form. Let me repeat that the fact that the different aspects of meaning and sense are not always identical does not diminish my model’s validity: Every act of sense comprehension is, in fact, different (even when the same person is comprehending the same utterance for a second or nth time); yet, provided relevant LPI/LPC identity obtains, communication has prospered. I do not assert that sensic identity invariably obtains, but limit myself to posit its existence as an indispensable felicity condition of communication. If the speaker has meant one thing and the interlocutor has understood another, such identity, of course, has not been established - but then communication has failed. In our example, the children will have understood exactly Peter’s direct intended sense, so that LPI=LPC. The contextual effects of comprehension As I have pointed out, I am referring here to two different kinds of contextual effects of LPI comprehension: cognitive and qualitative. Cognitive effects can be thought of in terms of metarepresentations, among others, of indirect intended sense or deep meaning - i.e. of the actual conscious or unconscious intentions and motivations behind the speaker’s speech behaviour. Qualitative effects are purely emotive. Pragmatic effects could perhaps be seen as their meeting point.

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In our example, cognitively, some of the children will have believed that Peter is saying the truth, while others -probably most of them- will have realised that he is lying. Qualitatively, some will have felt pity, others shame, others irritation, etc. The articulation of the speech act The double articulation of the utterance We can see, then, a double articulation of any utterance, somewhat analogous to that of language, where linguistic units already doubly articulated (phonemes, morphemes, lexemes, syntagms, clauses, sentences), but lacking sense on their own, are strung together by the speaker, basically according to the semantic and syntactic rules of a given language, to become coupled to a pragmatic intention that avails itself of them in order to express an intended sense embodied in a specific utterance or text. The multiple articulation of the speech act A more refined analysis would lead us to perceive a) below the utterance, both articulations of language resulting in a syntactically organised chain of linguistic signifiants and signifiés; b) a notch above, the articulation of the utterance’s linguistic meanings and its literal meaning; c) above literal meaning, the articulation between it and objective meaning (always in a dialectical formcontent relationship); d) then that of objective meaning and direct intended sense; e) thereafter the articulation between direct and indirect intended sense; next, f) the confluence of indirect intended sense and pragmatic intention; g) the articulation between pragmatic intention and motivation; and -last stop before exiting the communication act- h) that of motivation and deep meaning. (Whereby translation would be, in its turn, a new articulation, as suggested by Di Virgilio (1984).) The totem could be summarised as follows: (DEEP MEANING)56 MOTIVATION PRAGMATIC INTENTION INDIRECT INTENDED SENSE DIRECT INTENDED SENSE (OBJECTIVE MEANING) (LITERAL MEANING) FIRST ARTICULATION OF LANGUAGE ([signifiés]) FIRST ARTICULATION OF LANGUAGE (/signifiants/) SECOND ARTICULATION OF LANGUAGE (phonemes/graphemes)

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In the case of our little hero, the totem would be: (FEAR/INSECURITY) FINDING AN EXCUSE EXCUSING ONESELF BY EXPLAINING AWAY I’d love to, but I cannot My parents won’t allow me (They won’t allow me) (They refuse to/shall not i the future allow/lease me) “([they won’t let me])” “(/they won’t let me/)” “/t-h-e-y w-o-n-t l-e-t m-e/”

Obviously, this scheme of the space surrounding a sign chain can only be established from the pole of comprehension; We will always be analising a speech act initiated by someone else (even if it was us). The scheme can be summarised as follows: Prior to elocution, we have a speaker, acting as a persona, who, out of his conscious and unconscious motivations, has come up with a pragmatic intention to be expressed through an intended sense linguistically framed into an utterance or text. Text and linguistic context are placed within an extra-linguistic context that specifies sense. This sense becomes the meaning of the text or the utterance and thus more or less objective, in so far as the majority of the interlocutors would agree on it in a specific situation. With the disappearance or ignorance of the relevant extra-linguistic factors, the utterance is left with nothing but its literal sense - a notch above what a machine can manage, which is but literal linguistic meaning. The utterance lends itself, moreover, to a transcendental interpretation beyond intended and objective sense, in which, to a keener interlocutor, the speaker’s speech act reveals its deep meaning. Needless to say, in order to arrive from the speaker’s psyche and intention to the interlocutor’s intellection, an utterance travels a rough path: the speaker’s emotive, intellectual, linguistic, and rhetorical competence and disposition; the clarity of the communication channel; the extra-linguistic context; the setting and circumstances of communication; the accessibility of the encyclopaedic knowledge base, microworld; culture; and the rhetorical, linguistic, intellectual, and emotive competence of the interlocutor. (For emotive competence, I understand a double sensitivity: the ability to perceive a) the utterance’s indirect intended sense and deep meaning, and b) the aesthetic aspect of the linguistic framing - both a must for the appreciation of literature.) It is obvious that there are no precise boundaries between persona, intention, setting, circumstances, encyclopaedic knowledge base, microworld, and culture; nor is it always possible clearly to distinguish that which is still linguistic form that which no longer is. All factors of speech penetrate and influence each other, and change as discourse develops. On the other hand, we know that even in face-to-face communication the situation formants are not identical for speaker and 90

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interlocutor. For one thing, there is always a difference in the extent of shared pre-comprehension schemes, including the cognitive ability and emotive disposition to cooperate; if it becomes too wide, then relevant LPI/LPC identity becomes altogether impossible. The asymmetry between meaning and ability to mean and willingness and ability to understand Six-year-old David Copperfield listens intently while Mr. Murdstone talks cryptically to a friend, without realising that the conversation is about him (i.e. he understands what Mr. Murdstone says but not what he means). As a matter of fact, Murdstone knows he has two interlocutors equipped with different abilities and dispositions to understand. David thinks that he is a mere observer, but evil Mr. Murdstone is engaging in two simultaneous speech acts, with a single LPI, one addressed to David, who, as Murdstone knows, will interpret it on the basis of the literal meaning of F, and the main one addressed to his friend, who can directly proceed to metarepresent indirect intended sense. Murdstone wants David not to understand his indirect intended sense and manages to conceal it. From this standpoint, David ends up understanding exactly what his stepfather means him to understand. As I pointed out, in order for communication to succeed it is not necessary -it may even be counterproductive- that an interlocutor grasp the speaker’s true motivations and intentions. If David could understand more than he does, communication between him and Murdstone would have failed (but unfortunately for David, it does not)57. As it has become transparent, meaning to mean (Meinen) and understanding (Verstehen) are not symmetrical activities (see Hörmann 1976), in that they pursue different aims. Speaker and interlocutor never are moved by exactly mirror interests, no matter how overlapping they may be. The more these interests are in conflict, the harder for communication to succeed, especially at the pragmatic level – and the harder the mediator’s task. My development of García Landa’s model brings in this asymmetry most explicitly: It starts before the speech act proper with the motivations and intentions that lead the speaker to open his mouth in the first place, and then interposes the interlocutor’s own interests in (or resistance to) understanding, which inevitably filters comprehension and its effects; and it ends after the speech act - with the effects that comprehension has upon him. As a matter of fact, a speaker may very well not wish to speak - otherwise torture would be unnecessary. Whenever I refer to 57

Relevance theorists distinguish between naively optimistic, cautiously optimistic and sophisticated understanding on the basis of the degree of metarepresentative ability actually applied when processing an utterance. I submit that naive optimism is the bane of the profession, and that cautious optimism prevents translators from mediating actively. Only sophisticated understanding allows for an adequate global and specific assessment of what counts as relevant LPIo/LPCi identity at each turn (see, inter alia, Setton (2001) and, especially, Sperber (2000)). © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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the speaker’s motivation I mean any motivation he may have, including a negative one: the interlocutor may be much more interested in understanding than the speaker in making himself understood. The reason I do mention explicitly the interlocutor’s possible resistance is that, under normal circumstances, the speaker may consciously choose not to speak; whereas, once the speaker has chosen to speak, the interlocutor cannot help understanding - his only negative choice is misunderstanding. Misunderstanding can be consciously feigned, of course, but it can only be “honest” when the unwillingness to understand is unconscious. By the same token, the speaker can knowingly lie the only way of lying “honestly,” however, is if the willingness to hide the truth is also unconscious. This is why the unconscious motivation and/or resistance both to speak and to understand is so decisive a factor in human communication. Emerson’s lines: “They reckon ill who leave me out: when me they fly, I am their wings,” could bear the signature of the unconscious. Indeed, an interlocutor (or any other subject of comprehension), on his part, does not understand exclusively as a function of his hermeneutic package: he must be willing to apply it. If we can venture to postulate an LPI’s relevance for whomever decides to communicate it, it is too naive to presume that all those who perceive it will be equally interested. Also, it is not enough to mean to say to be able aptly to communicate, as it is not enough to be willing to understand in order to manage. In both instances it is necessary to be both willing and able. Every interlocutor finds some things difficult or impossible to understand intellectually or cognitively (an insufficient hermeneutic package), which tallies with García Landa’s concept. But then there are things that an interlocutor will not understand because of non-cognitive psychological barriers. Five prototypical cases come to mind: 1) Animosity towards the speaker. 2) Total lack of interest in the LPI proper (viz. when what someone is saying to us comes in one ear and goes out the other). 3) When we do not want to understand an LPI (if we are told something that we know or fear will hurt us). 4) When our mind is simply elsewhere (we are too worried or excited about something that prevents us from paying attention to what they are saying to us, no matter how momentous)58. 5) When we are too tired (since understanding is, also, doing, and one eventually gets tired of doing). In other words, if from the standpoint of the speaker his utterance’s functionality (and more generally, relevance) is the synthesis of his pragmatic intention, his LPI and his verbalisation thereof, an interlocutor assigns it according to his own sensitivity and interests and to the cognitive and qualitative effects that comprehension produces upon him. Every interlocutor invariably filters his comprehension through his own conscious and, above all, unconscious motivation or resistance, showing himself more or less ready to cooperate. This is, obviously, the reason that laws and generally texts that impose legal or moral 58

This latter case was suggested by a student of mine.

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responsibility are so exasperatingly explicit and prolix: they are addressed to people who do not really want to cooperate in understanding them. And that is also the reason that emotively loaded interlocutors find it so difficult to exchange the most propositionally innocent LPIs. If in direct communication we can make abstraction of this asymmetry, it is impossible to ignore it in mediation. So is there room for perceptual identity after all? Indeed there is – otherwise the species could not survive and Peter would not have managed to communicate with his friends. But we have seen that in order for communication relevantly to succeed, i.e. to succeed for all practical purposes at the metacommunicative level, what is required (the only thing that is actually possible in practice) is that between meaning meant and meaning understood, between intended and comprehended sense, between LPI and LPC there obtain a sufficient degree of identity together with a pragmatically acceptable correlation between the speaker’s motivations and intentions on the one hand, and, on the other, the contextual effects that comprehension finally produces on the interlocutor. Successful communication, in my view, is both less and more than total LPI/LPC identity at the micro level. Yes, I would love it if you devoured every word I have taken the trouble to write, if you found fascinatingly relevant every single LPI in this book. So would you, as a matter of fact. But it would be naive even to dream of it. We can both die most happily if you understand what is really relevant to you and are not too unhappy about it. This would be the minimum that would have made my effort and yours mutually relevant. If we have achieved more, so much the better. This is what a mediator (and not necessarily an interlingual one) has as his professional task: not simply to re-say that which has been said, not just to reproduce an LPI, but to reproduce it in as relevant a way as possible under the circumstances. If speaker and interlocutor communicate successfully with each other, they do not need a mediator. If the only obstacle intervening between them is language, then García Landa’s model applies lock, stock and barrel: All that the translator has to do is reproduce LPIs back and forth without worrying about the pragmatic success of his task or the metarepresentations that it gives rise to. But language is never the only obstacle! A translator who just, well, translates, whatever the circumstances, whatever the stakes, whatever the consequences, whatever the coincidences or divergences in outlook, interests, ideology, sophistication, intelligence or sensitivity between the interlocutors, a translator, for instance, who does not know when it is deontologically necessary not to translate, is, and I am weighing my words most carefully, a dreadful mediator. Think of a mediator who would “just translate,” exactly the same way, between two Prime Ministers and a physician and a four-year-old survivor of the Rwandan massacre: dreadful, right?

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Successful communication, then, consists in establishing adequate -i.e. relevant- identity between sense as intended and sense as understood. There is an inevitable loss59 between feeling and thinking, thinking and meaning to mean, meaning to mean and ability to say, ability to say and actual uttering. From then on, another series of mirror entropies goes all the way down to an interlocutor’s unconscious. Part of these losses is irreversible, for either speaker or interlocutor or both, but evolution has endowed us with key tools that, most of the time, allow us to salvage what is really relevant. These tools are our second signal-system and our ability to infer. Communication and knowledge would be impossible without them. A non-trivial example: The sad case of Derek Bentley On page two of its 1-2 August 1998 edition, The Herald Tribune tells the following story: On the night of 2 November, 1952, a nineteen-year-old called Derek Bentley and his sixteen-year-old friend, Christopher Craig, were caught by the police as they attempted to burglarise a warehouse in south London. While Bentley was held by one Constable Miles, Craig shot and killed one of the policemen. Although Bentley took no part in the killing, three officers testified that he had yelled, ‘Let him have it, Chris!’ inciting his friend to fire at Miles. It mattered little that Bentley denied having said any such thing and that other witnesses confirmed it; the fact is that he was found guilty, sentenced to death and hanged, whilst Craig, a minor, was only sentenced to prison and freed ten years later. Be that as it may, regardless of Bentley’s intention, the fact that Craig had interpreted that stimulus of ostensive communication “in good faith” was not in question: He had understood, without further reflection, the most probable sense, i.e. the one most compatible with optimum relevance, given the speaker, the situation and Craig’s own predisposition to understand (itself a product of his persona, his overall predisposition and the very situation). If he had misunderstood, it was not that he meant to misunderstand, but that he sincerely had felt incited to fire. On 30th July 1998, Britain’s highest court overturned Bentley’s conviction. Among other things, the Court argued that even if he had yelled, ‘Let him have it!’ the statement was ambiguous: It could bear an innocent meaning, being an encouragement by the appellant to Craig to hand over his weapon. As can be seen, if indeed there were no real distinction between linguistic meaning and intended sense, nor between the latter and objective meaning, Derek Bentley might not have been executed. But let us pause at the totally opposite analyses that the original judge and the Court make of the same speech act and utterance. It all hinges upon how to interpret the sign chain ‘Let him have it’ and the intention behind it in that specific situation. 59

Again, what Venuti (1991, 1995, 1998 and 2000) calls “ the remainder,” and Osimo (2001) “ residuo.” 94

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In what follows, my purpose has nothing to do, in fact, with Bentley’s speech act or with those that came after it. Since speech is always understood as meaning meant and not as a string of linguistic meanings liable to countless semantic computations, Bentley’s sentencing was not based on any of the possible literal interpretations of Fo, but on its idiomatic one, which could be paraphrased as ‘Give him what’s coming to him.’ Thus, unknowingly applying my development of García Landa’s model, the jury interpreted it as ‘Shoot him,’ or even ‘Kill him.’ I say applying the model but, of course, I mean “naturally,” since the model does nothing other than explaining post factum how these and other utterances are understood (or misunderstood). Bentley was found guilty as an abettor in the constable’s murder because those who condemned him interpreted the relevant speech act thus: With the conscious motivation (nobody cared a hoot about Bentley’s unconscious, even though he had the mental age of 11 and was prone to seizures) of having his accomplice kill the policeman and the pragmatic intention of instigating him, the speaker meant to mean ‘Kill him;’ in order to convey which he resorted to the idiomatic expression ‘Let him have it,’ which, despite its literal meaning, in that specific situation and moment, upon which gravitated all the relevant experiences and pre-comprehension schemes shared by the speaker and his interlocutor, the latter could not but interpret the speaker’s utterance exactly as the speaker meant it: ‘Kill him.’ Having understood Derek perfectly, Chris shot and killed the policeman. Both judge and jury postulated LPI/LPC identity and W>Y/A correlation. Half a century later, the Court, itself applying the same model, came up with the opposite interpretation: Unconsciously motivated by fear and consciously motivated by the wish not to make things worse, Bentley could have meant to say ‘Give yourself up,’ in order to do which, and specifically with Craig’s gun in mind, he resorted to the idiomatic expression ‘Let him have it,’ counting on the fact that in that situation, at that moment, governed by the relevant experiences and pre-comprehension schemes shared with his friend, this would lead Chris to understand ‘Give him your weapon.’ His friend paid no heed or, ultimately, “misinterpreted” Bentley’s words as a verbalisation of the opposite meaning meant. So that the Court postulated that, in the end, there had been no LPI/LPC identity - let alone W>Y/A correspondence. But neither the original judge and jury nor the Court doubted for an instant that, if Bentley had clearly uttered the chain ‘Let him have it,’ then Craig had understood the words perfectly well: the linguistic competence of the interlocutors was never in question. It is decisive that what was judged both in 1952 and in 1998 was neither the linguistic meaning of the utterance nor the intention to verbalise it: what was judged was the intention to do by verbalising it. The question in both instances was whether Bentley had been an instigator of the murder or not. Years before Austin and Searle it was known -if not consciously- that to say is always to do. And that so is to understand: Craig’s reaction was deemed to be a direct product of his own (mis-)comprehension. Another crucial fact is that those who

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sentenced Bentley at that time and those who exculpated him later had never been interlocutors or witnesses to the original speech act. They proceeded as we, readers, do who perceive the linguistic chain extracted from its original situation and protagonists and try to reconstruct it, imagine them and thus establish the original intentionality. In the first reading situation (at that historic time where, among other things, the right of the accused were less valued than nowadays), the judge and the jury resorted to all manner of enquiries and testimonies and, finally, chose (arbitrarily or not) a specific interpretation of the LPI as a function of a criminal motivation and the consequent intention to instigate to murder. Fifty years later the reading situation had changed drastically, as had the legally authorised interpreters. The chain remained immutable, except that what was judged anew was not that but the very speech act and, above all, the speaker’s motivation and intention. And a different interpretation of the LPI was arrived at that referred to a similar pragmatic intention to instigate an action, except that this time around it was a different action, as a result of an innocent motivation. Also, the lack of equanimity by the original judge was assessed. If this time around the Court is governed by a motivation to serve justice, the original judge was bent on condemning Bentley, whereby he filtered his comprehension -again, not of the linguistic utterance, but of the sense that Bentley consciously meant to confer upon it- through his own reactionary prejudices and motivations. Let me remind you of my developed model of the written act of speech, which is what Bentley’s verbal speech act had become by the time of his judgement. I said that the reader -any reader- is alone before the linguistic chain and must resort to his hermeneutic package to “discover” the intended speech perception. At the trial, Bentley was present and vainly tried to deny it. Neither the judge nor the jury believed him, and proceeded to apply, governed by their predisposition, their own hermeneutic wherewithal with a view to reconstructing the situation and discovering the LPI. The original speech act (or, at least, the one analysed at the trial) WZ > Yy > LPIKo → Fo(XmL,SmH,VmR,JmQ)CmEn]GPMVHtm ↔ UZ > LPCKo→ Aa

has vanished before the fateful shot is fired. All that the “readers,” then and now, coincided in perceiving the same chain Fo (‘Let him have it, Chris’) without the crucial C and E!. Except that the situation in which they strove to interpret it was radically different: [Fo(XmL,SmH)CmEm]GL1PMVHtm+n1 ↔ UZ > LPCKo→ Aa1 -----------------------------------DLo1--------------------------------[Fo(XmL,SmH)CnEn]GL2PMVHtm+n+n2 ↔ UZ > LPCKo2 → Aa2 --------------------------------------DLo2-----------------------------------

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All the left-hand components have changed: GPM, UZ, LPCKo and Aa, and this leads to analysing the same Fo as a verbalisation of a whole different series of factors to the right hand of the model: WZ, Yy and LPIKo. In doing this, they all imagine a different paralinguistic (C) and kinetic (E) configuration (the ones believe they see and hear rage and the others - fear). It goes without saying that the evolution of society as a whole, of ideology, of ethics, of the concept of justice, of the worth of human life (in 1965 the death penalty had been abolished), and, therefore, of the legal microworld mean a decisive change in the conscious motivation of the new jurists now interpreting the speech act. Who is right? In truth, we shall never know: hermeneutics is always hypothetical and liable to be corrected, modified or refuted. My development of García Landa’s model explains how it is indeed possible for both interpretations to be arrived at, but the justification of either of them depends, among many other less obvious factors, on the intelligence, ability, sensibility and honesty of those who mean to understand. It matters little, for my purposes, whether Bentley did or did not say what the say he said. His alleged speech act, in any event, remained encrusted in the speech acts by those who asserted that he did. From the standpoint of relevance theory, Bentley would have used language descriptively, i.e. verbalising a propositional content in order to refer to -in this case to modify- a state of affairs in the world. Those who claimed to be quoting him used language interpretively -i.e. in order to reproduce the propositional content of someone else’s utterance, not to refer to the state of affairs to which the original act allegedly referred toand their respective interpretations were opposite. Practical consequences for mediators Let me jump the gun while the iron is hot (hail mixed metaphors!). All of the above, I hope, is very interesting, but how would an awareness of such subtleties as the different layers of meaning and sense affect translation practice? In other words, in what cases would a mediator translate differently out of such awareness? The footnotes so far have hinted at some obvious instances. First, may I repeat just in case that, normally (NB normally, i.e. in most cases but by far not in all) a mediator’s aim is not to “translate” –i.e. to make explicit– the speaker’s motivation or pragmatic intention. His strictly translational job is to produce a new chain Fi, but always as a function of his LPIi (itself a function of his LPCo) which in this case -and unlike Bentley’s!- is consciously ambiguous, since it must be attributable to opposed motivations. Once a mediator decides that that is the relevant identity to be sought between the new LPIi and the readers’ LPCi, his conscious motivation is to produce a Di analogous to the Do by preserving the ambiguity of Fo in Fi. Is it possible? If it is not, then all his prowess will be limited to explaining, compensating, concealing or, even, omitting. But if it is, it is there that his worth as a translator proper is to be proven. Still, it is best to remember a crucial fact: One never © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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really knows, in fact, whether this new identity is absolutely impossible; we only know that, in certain cases, no one has been found yet who has managed it. The possibilities of Medicine are not to be mistaken for the limitations of physicians, nor the possibility of Translation for those of translators. Fine! But how do we reproduce interpretively, say, in Spanish Bentley’s Fo now that the circle appears to be closed? How in such a way that Fi is equally natural and ambiguous, so that the Spanish reader can feel the story in his own guts, as if it could have happened in a Spanish-speaking country or, in any event, in the Spanish language? After all, this ought in principle to be the aim of a literary translation that seeks to become a part of the target polysystem, as propounded by all Russian translatologists. If Bentley, Craig, the constables and the judges had spoken any other language, the LPI would probably have been clear and injustice would have been forced to look for a different excuse. The model I propose ends here; from now on it is a matter of translating -if translating is possible in this instance- armed with all these criteria: A translator must seek to maintain relevant LPIo/LPCi identity, which in the case of this text -inside which, as in Chinese boxes, Bentley’s alleged Do is reproduced- is a function of showing the situational ambiguity of Fo. We are no longer dealing with more or less clever literal interpretations, but with opposite objective meanings. It is no longer a matter of the speech act initiated by Bentley in that fatal instant, or of the speech acts initiated by those who quoted him at the trial, or by those who ended up exonerating him, or by me as I told you this story. If you had to translate at a trial where the Bentley case was invoked as a precedent, how would you translate ‘Let him have it?’ Let us analyse, as a case in point, the semantic potential of that chain ‘Let him have it’ that Bentley is supposed to have uttered, and its possible Spanish equivalent(s). In order to do that, I must proceed to what Catford calls a rankbound translation, i.e. to re-coding the units of a certain level, in this case, the semantic one. I deem relevant the closest possible Fo(XmL,SmH)/Fi(XnL,SnH) equivalence. The problem, as always, is that each language semantically segments and syntactically articulates the content plane in its own way. The verb “to let” can be “translated” in many different ways: “dejar,” “permitir,” “autorizar,” etc.; but also “arrendar,” “alquilar,” etc. “Him” is less polysemic: objective case of the third-person masculine (i.e. animated) personal pronoun (Spanish, by the way, does not distinguish “it” from “him”). “Have” is yet another polysemic verb: “tener,” “poseer,” etc.; but also the syntactic auxiliary “haber.” The forms “let” and “have” are used as infinitives, imperatives, present indicatives in all persons except third singular and, in the case of “let,” also as past in all persons and, to boot, as past participle. Any Spanish chain we choose to put together will mean at the same time more, less and differently. No matter how deft the translator, a Spanish speaker with no knowledge of English could never become a virtual participant in this act of speech; all that a translator can do is save such a speaker from the exclusion caused by his hermeneutic voids 98

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all these metalinguistic explanations would allow this speaker to observe, but not to participate. Often, this is the most a mediator can achieve. At other times, this is all that is required. Here are several semantic translations, all equally possible: ¡Deja/deje/dejad/dejen que (él) la/lo/le tenga! ¡Déja/deje/dejen/dejádselo/la! ¡Da/dé/dén/dádselo/la!

We can clearly see that there appears to be no possible descriptive Spanish verbalisation, for the simple reason that there is no single chain Fi that can refer either to a single semantic representation capable, in turn, to refer to those two different LPIis, or to two different semantic representations each referring to either of the two LPIs - in other words, a chain that can be used naturally in that situation to describe two opposed (wished for) states of the world. And even if reproducing the utterance interpretively, what can the translator have Bentley say? ‘Kill him’ or ‘Give up’? How to translate literally for the reader who does not know English this sentence that proved such a key utterance? What Spanish chain interpretively resembles most that English chain? How do you, in this specific case, translate the speaker’s words “properly,” as Pearl (1995) admonishes? Do you go for literal meaning? Which? Objective meaning? Which? Intended sense? Which? Deep meaning? Which? It is a very tricky business, and if the translation is to function as a legal document, say as an official record, the translator cannot spread his wings too broadly. In that case, the most acceptable solution would probably be a detailed explanation of the problem. This, of course, is no longer “translation,” but it still remains what a translator must do under the circumstances. And if it is not translation, then how come the translator must perform it anyhow? Ah, but here the translator dons his mediator cap, see? Yes, here they seem to be completely different: one head, two caps. But more often than not, a translator must wear a hybrid cap. Some authentic cases May I now introduce three authentic practical examples where the mediator must choose to verbalise according to different layers of comprehended meaning: i. An archetypical instance is the rather evident choice of indirect intended sense over direct intended sense when audience response is essential (advertisements being a clear-cut case). One of the English texts for the UN Spanish translation exam a few years ago referred to the inordinate number of lawyers in the US and added “Washington DC alone boasts several thousand practitioners.” I suggest that -in the specific situation, of course- the phrase be rendered attending primarily to the obviously ironic contradiction between intended (negative) sense and © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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objective (positive) meaning (the author left no doubt that, in his view, having thousands of lawyers is nothing to brag about; as opposed to the case below, this time around the formal incongruity is intentional). Any turn with “jactarse” and its synonyms would not sound natural in Spanish. A possible rendition could be “Solo por Washington se pasean miles de profesionales” [“Thousands of practitioners roam Washington DC alone”60]. ii. Next comes a case where direct intended sense prevails over objective or even literal meaning: A few years ago, a delegate thanked the UN Secretary-General for his “contribution to the crisis” - coward that I am, I thanked him for his “contribution to overcoming the crisis” - I wonder whether even the most uncompromising advocates of transparency and fidelity would have done otherwise! iii. Lastly, an instance of deep meaning prevailing over intended sense: In several tapped telephone conversations between drug dealers that I have had to translate for a law-enforcement agency in the US, a normally unnoticeable lapsus linguae may have proved crucial, since it might be giving away information that the speakers had no wish to communicate much less have overheard by the cops: It was an instance of a feminine adjective mistakenly used to qualify a boy-courier (‘El muchacho, tú sabes, es muy rápida’)... Was he in fact a girl? I sensed that the mistake could be important, so I rendered it as naturally as I could (‘The boy, you know, she’s very fast’). I also added the relevant explanatory note. As in the case of the unintended insult to the UN Secretary General, this kind of difficulties shows that the translator or interpreter has a responsibility that goes far beyond the sheer reverbalisation of an LPI - that of mediating effectively, so that the LPI/LPC identity established is relevant. In the first instance, the translator adopts the LPIo as his own LPIi and reverbalises it without manipulation, thus the process reproduces something close to García Landa’s prototypical model: LPIo=LPCo=LPIi=LPCi. In the second one, the interpreter corrects an obvious mistake with a view not to embarrass the speaker and his interlocutors (and possibly even himself). In the 60

The back-translation offers a further example of the different rhematisation patterns in Spanish and English. Note also the transmutation of “practitioners” into “profesionales” and back into “practitioners,” as well as the lesser irony of “roam” vis-à-vis “pasearse.” Had the original been in Spanish, the English translator would be well advised to opt for “boasting.” Lastly, “solo por Washington” can be also read as “only in Washington,” rather than “in Washington alone,” but the intended sense is obvious enough to preclude such an inane interpretation by any sophisticated interlocutor (a translator should never forget Seleskovitch’s dictum about the non-imbecility of the reader). 100

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third, the translator deliberately reproduces a verbalisation mistake because he guesses that it may be relevant to his clients, who are not interlocutors to the original speaker, but interested observers61.Strictly speaking, there is no LPIo/LPCi identity, since the speaker surely does not mean to give away the “boy’s” sex. But let us remember that in these circumstances the mediator’s professional position is most particular: He is not mediating between Spanishspeaking drug-dealers and US law-enforcement agents. His loyalty is owed squarely to the latter, whose interest is to nab the speakers62. The translator thus offers a faithful reproduction of the communication between them. Were he to mediate between a Spanish-speaking and an Anglophone drug-dealer, he would be better advised not to reproduce the slip of the tongue, lest he find himself at the bottom of the East River. Conversely, the translation of the insult to the Secretary General that I offered above is for my interlocutors, specifically for you, who are interested, precisely, in the mistake, and not for the speaker’s interlocutors - much less for the UN Secretary General himself. In short, then, the mediator’s deontological duty is to a) detect possible anomalies in Fo, b) strive to elucidate whether there is a deep or indirectly intended meaning behind them or they are simple mistakes, c) establish whether it might be relevant for the originator of the translation, and if so, d) opt between omitting, correcting, reproducing and/or explaining them. Although for the nonce no absolute rules can be established, it is important to remind and teach that, as the examples above reveal, instances higher than Fo prevail - the relevant decision is the most momentous that a mediator is called upon to make. What is, then, to “translate” We have, as discussed, basically two angles from which to examine the phenomenon: a) the standpoint of what following Searle (1995) we might call its constitutive rule -the kind of language game that people who translate play- and b) that of all the social (professional, expectancy, product) norms governing its specific practice under specific circumstances at specific times. What I am primarily interested in is the fundamental first approach. On the basis of the widest possible experience, taking stock of what all translators and all interpreters, as far as I can tell, have done and do, I seek inductively to find what translation is always, what every translation -whether written or oral, natural or professional- is, however disconcertingly heterogeneous translators’ practice and products through time and space may be. The question I am trying to answer, as I told you, is: What is it that every translator has done or does -competently or 61

See Pym’s (1992a and b) excellent analysis.

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Which, of course, does not mean for a moment that it is deontologically legitimate for them to “doctor” meaning meant in order to suit their interests. There are, however, precedents: in order to avoid or overcome censorship -which can be justified- or to ingratiate themselves with their patrons -which cannot- many translators have done precisely that. © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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ineptly, consciously or unconsciously- that we may call it translating? Or, as García Landa asks: What does somebody who wishes to translate have to do for a translation to exist? I think it makes no sense to study the ancillary unless one has a precise idea of the essential. I am among those for whom translation is a subtype of interlingual mediated communication, which intervenes when the participants in the communicative event require (or pretend requiring - a case not much researched) a mediator conversant with the different languages involved. The great insights and polemics, the constant oscillation between sensum de senso and verbum e verbo, the two Schleiermacherian directions, les belles infidèles, Savory’s dichotomies, Newmark’s semantic and communicative approaches, the tug-of-war between sourcières and ciblistes, etc. have been ever closer intuitive approximations to what precisely is to be communicated by the translator. Over the centuries, those dispersed and sparse insights slowly converged towards a synthetic view of the dialectic tension between categories such as form and content, addressor and addressee, formal and dynamic equivalence, source- and target cultures, etc. With time and the literal explosion of translational practice in multiple new directions, especially over the last forty or fifty years, new factors and phenomena were identified, such as function, text-type, skopos, loyalty, norm, etc., widening, and, at the same time, streamlining what basically remained an elusive concept. A clearer notion of language and speech, culture, the workings of cognition, communication and comprehension, etc. contributed from without. Quantity led to quality: An ever richer practice broadened and deepened awareness, until the relevant collective practical experience was finally in place so that homo transferens could come up with a synthesis of everything that had accumulated over time. Intuition has thus finally come to fruition. The basic question, then, boils down to what communication is (in general, and more specifically, lingual, interlingual, mediated, and mediated interlingual communication) and how it is achieved. The answer, again, is only possible if we contemplate the phenomenon in its totality, to wit: a) the subjects of communication are specific, historically and situationally conditioned human beings interacting within social reality - i.e. within the production and exchange of commodities and models of the world, b) the essence of communication is producing LPs as a part of such general social interaction, c) the motivation of communication is a wish (conscious or unconscious, healthy or neurotic, magnanimous or selfish) for what is perceived as a favourable modification or consolidation of the perceived state of the world and/or one’s -or the group’s- position in it, and d) the purpose of communication is to help achieve such a wish. These exchanges are possible because evolution has produced socio-neuronal systems that allow us to comprehend, segment, conceive, imagine, analyse, store, retrieve and convey our representation of experience through the organising filter of a second signal-system that enables generating, systematising, storing, manipulating and transmitting signs with conventional semantic value. According to this view, then, translation (as, 102

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indeed, communication) is a social, not physical, phenomenon, and should be treated as such. As I shall try to prove, this is crucial: It is in this general production and exchange of commodities and models of the world that all translational speech acts take place, and there is little point in pretending otherwise. Another capital insight is that, as cognition itself, communication is inferential: The relevant perception is not produced by the sign(s) –whether linguistic or not– but inferred from them by each individual speaker or interlocutor on the basis of relevance - relevance that is always subjective, relative to the individual speaker’s or interlocutor’s pre-comprehension schemes, motivations and disposition here and now. Since neither literary studies nor linguistics can explain both cognitive inference and qualitative effects they cannot explain cognition, comprehension, communication, or translation either. Translatology comes of age when it finally manages to wean itself from the “humanistic” paradigm of literature and the “scientific” paradigm of linguistics in order to find its rightful place within the theory of mediated communication. The problem of similarity reduced to size63 I have suggested that the LPI behind its original Fo (or any other one) is a type, whereas its original verbalisation (or any other one) is a token of it. This explains that radically different verbalisations of a given LPI can be identical to their type while remaining different from each other to several degrees. Thus, any given translated text can be judged on two different axes: vertically, as a token of its type, and horizontally, with respect to other tokens (to the original or to other translations into the same or different languages). What has tended to obscure the first and most important axis is the fact that, especially in the case of authoritative texts, Fo is deemed to be the canonical verbalisation: new tokens must not only reproduce the type, but measure up to its canonical verbalisation (i.e. they are expected to be similar, equivalent or analogous to it). With purely pragmatic texts, instead, what normally matters is their functionality in the target language and culture. It does not really matter, for example, how perspicuously was Archimedes’s verbalisation of his principle. Pythagoras, as a case in point, did not have the concept of the abstract square function, so ours is a more perspicuous (read relevant) verbalisation than his. (Furthermore, the nongeometrical concept of square, i.e. as any value -even a non-linear onemultiplied by itself is, moreover what makes it possible for Einstein to conceive and speak of the light of speed “squared.”) It is important to keep in mind that the conjunction of extra-lingual perception and speech is ephemeral, lasting less than a second. Writing as the graphic fixation of speech and the written text as a graphic objectification of a speech act produce the mirage of a fleeting subjective speech perception forever 63

This approach, I submit, should put to rest Chesterman's (1996) musings on this score. © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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congealed. But it just a mirage. The perceptual conjunction of linguistic form and ideational content is renewed with every reading and is re-produced and vanishes almost at every clause. (Reading, let me stress, is as fleeting a consummation of the speech act as listening - except that it can be repeated at will.) Speech is always understood that way. And unless we have misunderstood (we initially missed, say, that “no” before the verb), spontaneously, we understand the same thing each time. What does change every time, what really counts in the end, are the metarepresentations that the series of identical fleeting speech perceptions gives rise to in a specific interlocutor: That, I repeat, is the true relativity of meaning; the possibility of understanding the same thing in a different way, of proceeding from the same direct intended sense to a different or even contradictory indirect intended sense or deep meaning towards the text’s depths (we read Moby Dick as an intended or unintended metaphor), or of objective or, with the evolution of language, even literal meanings towards its surface (as we shall see Snelling read the French etymology of “question” into the literal meaning of Hamlet’s monologue). Thus, no two readings of the same text, even by the same reader, no matter how close to each other in time, give rise to exactly the same metarepresentation with the same effects: The instructions that were confusing the first time around become clearer, the poem acquires new meaning, the causal aside reveals deeper implications. Or, conversely, the originality is lost, what had been a keen insight becomes trite, the joke is no longer funny, etc. Metarepresented sense is constructed by the interlocutor each time anew as an ongoing active process, even if the purported words on the page or on the tape remain unchanged - and the contextual effects of comprehension change accordingly as well. The Spanish translation of a British legal document may set as its purpose to foreground or palliate conceptual and formal differences between Roman and Common Law, whilst a reverbalisation of Romeo and Juliet cannot but answer to more pressing demands that will pull it, as the case may be, toward equivalence of effect here and now or to formal similarity between, in this case, a version in today’s Spanish and the original in sixteenth century English. In order to qualify as translations, all these different verbalisations must meet a single condition: achieving identity between intended and comprehended sense. Except that this is not enough for them to succeed as mediation – i.e. to be adequate with respect to the contextual effects of comprehension, which are a function of relevance, itself an ad hoc attribute. The polemics between similarity, analogy or other relations makes sense only between different specimens, since without LPIo/LPCi identity, by definition, there is no translation (be it as a result of a deliberate mediational move, be it because of a failed attempt: in the first instance the mediator’s skopos will be at stake, and in the second one, his prowess as a translator). If stress is made on “equivalent effect,” of course, we can more or less safely assume that Bernstein’s musical West Side Story achieves an emotional 104

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impact as immediate as Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet must have had in its time. In that sense, it is certainly more equivalent than the best translation, or even than any present-day reading of the Elizabethan tragedy. Is it a translation from XVIIth-century literary English into modern New York slang except that interspersed with more music? Indeed, a “translation” between registers, social variations and different synchronic stages of the “same” language could be questioned as translation proper, but, in reality, it is only a matter of degree Nida’s suggested translations for many passages in the Bible are as far removed from the original(s) as Maria and Tony from the Veronese lovers. Culturally speaking, the rival New York street gangs armed with chains and knives were more familiar and immediately acceptable to a popular New York audience (back then, in mid XXth century) than any Capulets or Montagues with their bejewelled renaissance blades. But if that kind of identity is not deemed relevant, whilst relevant identity entails awareness of cultural and historical differences, if the reader is not so much after a “localised” presentation of a somewhat abstract conflict but of Shakespeare’s perception and verbalization thereof, then traditional translations are more on the mark. All the identity that speech -and, therefore, translation- (more or less) ensures is between LPIo and LPCo/i, i.e. between direct intended and comprehended sense - everything else is relative, aleatory, circumstantial and, ultimately, unverifiable. God tells us -as the translators tell us that the original tells that he told Moses- “Thou shalt not kill.” Believers and atheists, Christians and “infidels,” Protestants and Catholics, Carmelites and Franciscans, men and women, both smart and dumb, understand the same direct intended sense. But they metarepresent it differently. Some interpret it metaphorically, as a relative injunction: “Thou shalt not kill... in principle.” Thou shalt not kill unless they are going to kill you, or it is for the good of the Faith, or the other guy is Black, or Chinese, or a Muslim, or a Protestant, or a Catholic, or a Communist, or has raped your daughter, or is having an affair with your wife, or is a convicted murderer, or a terminal patient, or the child of the man who lives near the army barracks that your smart bombs were meant to hit... A hard proposition, indeed, second guessing what the Almighty meant Moses and us to understand now that we understand that we are told, literally, objectively and directly, that we shall not kill! A lot of bloodshed has been caused by different interpretations of God’s indirect intended sense! Similarity, isotopy, equivalence and representation My contention would be that what a literary or documentary translator -as opposed to, say, an adapter or a “localiser” of a pragmatic text64- for instance, would normally seek to achieve is to represent a text in the target language and 64

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culture. In that respect, I cannot but agree with Goodman (as quoted by Ross 1981) that similarity is totally irrelevant to representation. In order to represent a three-dimensional image in perspective, for instance, the artist must distort it; this distortion is, precisely, what makes it look real. Something analogous happens when a translator seeks to represent a foreign work in a new linguistic and cultural medium. What, like all literalists, Nabokov gives us in his Oneguin is a bi- or even mono-dimensional image: in order to retain all the semantic details that the target language will allow (no miracle will allow him to retain any other), he has sacrificed the poem’s perspective - Oneguin now reads more as a semantic blueprint than as a literary speech act. As Goodman stresses, the goal of a literary (or, add I, documentary) translation that is meant to represent the work in the target language and culture is maximal preservation of what the original exemplifies -whether a sonnet or a death certificate- as well as of what it says. Ross adds that this emphasis on the importance of exemplification in translation is salutary, for we must indeed be concerned not only with the meaning of a work, but also with the kind of text of which a work or any of its components is an example (1981:13). The problem with Nabokov’s translation of Oneguin for a normal reader is that, whatever its semantic accuracy (indeed, because of it!) it is not an example of a poem - or even of an important work of art. In order to help the reader relevantly perceive a literary (or, for that matter, pragmatic) work as such, the translator cannot in the end but distort certain semantic or even propositional details. In order to maintain functionality, that is, similarity must defer to equivalence; except that equivalence has also been traditionally understood as a one-tier proposition (semantic, lexical, metric, effectual, etc.). If identity is pursued globally, then equivalence itself must defer to a package representation, in which well-nigh nothing may end up being similar or strictly equivalent in the end. The same applies to isotopy: any statistical and other analyses of what becomes what in parallel or translated texts or corpora must always bear in mind that intertextual isotopy, synonymy and isonymy, important as they indeed are for different pedagogical or professional purposes, are secondary with respect to the relevant identity pursued -and achieved- in each case. The status of formal equivalence Whatever they may mean as specimens of a given language, whatever the semantic representation they may give rise to, those words that the interlocutor makes out on the basis of the contrasts on the page or the noises on the tape are nothing but the circumstantial evidence of the speaker’s or writer’s direct intended sense. They have no sense in and of themselves - sense vicariously attributed to them is, in fact, attributed to the speaker (in the case of the Bible, to God Himself!). All too often, as I mentioned, the explicit or implicit assumption is that if those and no other are the words the speaker chose, he did it for a relevant reason (which sometimes may indeed be relatively true), thereby 106

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consciously or unconsciously weighting and rejecting each and every possible alternative (a somewhat more problematic proposition). A translator -and most especially a literary translator- more than all mediators and more than most readers, cannot but bear in mind that a host of conscious and unconscious, objective and subjective factors need have intervened between the author’s intention to communicate and his intended LP, and then between his verbalising it and the translator’s understanding of such verbalisation. The most relevant for the translator is, of course, the intention behind the words: not what they, the words, mean, but what he who wrote them meant by them - the kind of subjective perception to which such words gave objective, perceptible material form (which explains why practitioners feel authorised, nay, duty-bound to correct all sorts of inaccuracies or infelicities in even the most authoritative texts). This LPI or direct intended sense by the author is what the normal reader normally perceives, and this is what the competent translator ought, in principle, to give him: Metarepresentations are in principle (but not invariably) the interlocutor’s business (even though the mediator may orient them or wish to). Needless to point out, there is no objective way a translator -or, for that matter, any reader- can systematically verify that his understanding of, say, God’s or Shakespeare’s word is what the Almighty or the Bard themselves meant him to understand. Inside the isolated brain of either speaker or interlocutor, meaning meant can only be perceived as meaning understood, i.e. in many cases it can but be attributed. Be that as it may, the translator’s raw material is not so much the linguistic chain Fo as his own understanding of the LPI behind it. This direct intended sense is, again, what he normally -but, as we have seen, not necessarily- would strive to convey - with or without total or partial regard to any or all formal features of Fo and/or Fi. Regardless of its empirical verifiability, it can still be asserted that in order for mediation to have succeeded, the mediator must have managed relevantly to convey the meaning as originally meant so that it will be relevantly understood by his interlocutor(s) - i.e. to help achieve between specific human beings in a specific social situation relevant identity, i.e. identity of meaning plus an adequate correlation between intended and achieved contextual effects. Most exegetic, aesthetic and evaluative discussions will centre, precisely, on whether either of these two conditions has been met. Relevant identity - translation as mediation In this prototypical, ideal sense, translation is, thus, but the initiation of a second speech act in order to produce the same LP: the translator would ideally strive to -and succeed at- producing a second perception of meaning as officially meant. This, however, is seldom possible, necessary or advisable. The differences in time and place, personal and historic experience, knowledge and culture, interests and sensitivity, and, generally, in all manner of pre-comprehension © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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schemes and passing theories -i.e. in the hermeneutic and emotive package, combined with perceived relevance- mean that any new readership will approach an old text (whether original or translated) with different expectations, ability and willingness to understand (which, again, is the reason behind the many “updates” of certain texts for new generations of readers). Let us also remember that speech comprehension and the qualitative or cognitive effects of comprehension are different things, as are immediate, spontaneous speech comprehension and the different metarepresentations it may give rise to: in principle, direct intended sense comprehension is always possible, but the metarepresentations based on comprehension and the effects both of speech comprehension and of the metarepresentations it gives rise to tend to vary enormously. The confusion of these ontologically different processes has led to no mean amount of confusion among translation scholars and practitioners. Once the inevitable and often crucial “side effects” of spontaneous speech comprehension are brought into the picture, once we take stock of the inescapable asymmetry between meaning to mean and disposition to understand, then translation is more relevantly seen not as an end in itself, but as the main tool of interlingual mediation, whose purpose is to achieve relevant identity across the language barrier. In actual practice, translation is always mediation and it is, therefore, more practical to equate them, which is what most modern approaches do, since it is what all professional translators must do all the time, whatever their conscious or unconscious theoretical outlook: A translator who can only “translate” will end up starving or doing something else. Whether he is aware of it or not, with or without a specific brief, the translator ends up deciding what are the relevant aspects of the LPIo that he has understood as LPCo (relevant for the speaker alone, for him, the translator, alone, for some or all of his potential interlocutors alone or, more often than not, for some kind of ideal composite interlocutor), so as to come up with his own LPIi and proceed to try and verbalise it by means of a new semiotic chain so that in the end as adequate a correlation as possible may obtain between intended and metarepresented meaning, and between intentions and effects. Translation, as any other purposeful activity, has its own skopos, and translators, as any other people engaged in any other activity, have their own conscious and unconscious motivations, as well as their own pragmatic intentions: They may choose to adopt the motivations and intentions of the original speaker, of course, but they do not necessarily do so - the way they do not necessarily choose to understand from the standpoint of their own potential or actual interlocutors. In any event, whatever the differences at all possible levels between the original speech act and the translational one, the only criterion that will allow us to judge whether the translator’s -good or bad, more or less effective or apt- utterance or text is a socially relevant translation of the original speaker’s is whether we can say that it allows for meaning as meant to be relevantly understood, i.e. whether, as a 108

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result of the new semiotic chain being processed by a specific interlocutor in a specific situation, applying his hermeneutic and emotive package, relevant identity obtains between LPI and LPC across the language and concomitant cultural, hermeneutic and psychological barriers. In the case of translation, the differences in formal vehicles poses its own often insurmountable obstacles to achieving not so much relevant propositional identity as similar or equivalent or analogous or otherwise comparable metarepresentations and qualitative effects - i.e. contextual effects tout court. The conscious or unconscious manipulation of the specific limitations and possibilities of the linguistic system at the speaker’s disposal allows for certain ways of conveying propositional content that affect the subject of comprehension in different ways. When Nida speaks about equivalence of effect he refers, precisely, to the contextual effects produced as a consequence of having understood propositional content. Now since no two people are alike, such “equivalence of effect” is but a -legitimate- statistical abstraction based on an educated guess. This is particularly relevant in acts of literary speech (including, but not limited to literature proper) - those where both content and form are articulated so as to hit the subject of comprehension under the cognitive belly. Metaphors are the most common of all such devices, but since they are propositional and work by evoking basically cognitive associations they normally do not pose insurmountable difficulties. For the translator, the real problem arises when that hit under the cognitive belly comes from the manipulation of a speech percept’s linguistic form (including, most notably, the interplay of its semantic and phonetic forms). I have defined relevant identity as the relationship obtaining between ideational meaning meant and understood (in the Landan sense) coupled with an adequate correlation between the mediator’s intentions and the contextual effects of comprehension on his interlocutors - between different, not necessarily overlapping metarepresentations based on the perception of the same object, which in our case is always the same social object: meaning meant. Different “texts” being different objects, it stands to reason that there can be no identity at that level: readers of a translation are perceiving the same social object, meaning meant, in different formal guises. The relationship obtaining between these different forms, as different tokens of the same type, is no longer of identity but of equivalence, similarity, analogy or whatnot. Chesterman (1996) refers to this second, subsidiary look at translation as a comparison of tokens. The confusion has beset practitioners and theoreticians well nigh since the invention of writing and for a perfectly understandable reason. In the case of all works of literature and other “authoritative” texts, there seems to be a “mixed” type involved: the original LPI and its canonical verbalisation Fo. The LP can indeed be reverbalised in countless different ways and languages (its success at being understood depending on the speaker’s heuristic and the interlocutor’s hermeneutic abilities), but the canonical or any other verbalisation

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cannot. All that a translator can do is try and produce an equivalent or adequate token, equivalent or adequate from the standpoint of the effect intended by the translator, which normally, but not necessarily, may involve a certain formal correspondence between both verbalisations. In this light, the translator’s speech act can be judged from two categorially different angles: that of its skopos (i.e. the translator’s motivation and intention), and that of its accomplishment (i.e. the translator’s effectiveness as a speaker). The great difference between the translator and the original writer does not lie so much in that he, the translator, has to imitate, say, Shakespeare’s form or strive for any kind of comparable effect (nobody forces him to), but in that he must re-verbalise Shakespeare’s LP: his Hamlet must be the same as Shakespeare’s, and act the same way, and utter the same thoughts and give vent to the same feelings, and kill the same characters for the same reasons. Whatever the translator’s poetical prowess, any deviations from that will be mistranslations (however justified on extratranslational grounds). Because translators have at least intuitively realised that, and despite the fact that most of us do not have access to the original, we all have read Crime and Punishment - and not just anybody’s: Dostoevski’s - if rewritten by someone else. Otherwise, how could we talk and argue about it? On the other hand, as we are all so painfully aware, when propositional content is inextricably laced with linguistic form, the language game called translation becomes ever more difficult to play. The devastating impact of works such as Crime and Punishment is due mostly to the manipulation of propositional content - which explains why narrative prose generally survives mediocre writing, including mediocre translations: Verne and Conan Doyle are no literary giants. But when the relative role of propositional content becomes a lesser part of the emotive impact of comprehension, what literary use is conveying the LP alone, without the least chance of affecting one’s reader in any significant way? This is the great dilemma posed by the contradiction between propositional content and poetic function. As we all know, a prose rendition of King Lear can still be effective enough, but what use is a prose rendition of Pushkin’s Eugene Oneguin unless it is sublime? Before such an intricate imbrication of propositional content and linguistic form as, say, a sonnet by Shakespeare, the translator faces one basic initial dilemma: whether to engage in a literary speech act or not. The translation of literature, by the way, is not to be confused with literary translation. Literary translation is the translation whose skopos it is to produce a new literary act in another language, i.e. in preserving, if not necessarily aping, what Jakobson calls the poetic function, which means that the new act will of necessity be “measured” against the norms existing in the host literature. This has been traditionally the case, for instance, in Russian translational practice and theory, including émigrés such as Edmond Cary, but excepting, as we shall see, Vladimir Nabokov. Once a translation is taken to be a literary act, then the formal analyses and criticisms are no longer strictly translatological but literary. The task of the translatologist qua translatologist is 110

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to assess the degree and effectiveness of relevant identity achieved by a translator from the standpoint of a specific readership. Then comes the literary critic to assess the translated text as an autonomous verbalisation of meaning meant from the standpoint of its functional effectiveness. I am talking, of course, of two different kinds of analyses, not necessarily of two different people, although most of the reviewers in literary magazines limit themselves to speaking about the fluidity or idiomaticity of a translation (i.e. to judging its poetic functionality against established host norms), with little if any attention to what makes it one - the fact that it relevantly reverbalises the same LP. The dialectic synthesis of these two different translational and literary analyses and tasks is the province of interlingual literary mediation. A new definition of equivalence and adequateness In her most incisive article devoted to the concept of equivalence in translation studies, Halverson has the following to say: It becomes clear... that there are three main components to [a definition of equivalence]: a pair between which the relationship exists, a concept of likeness/sameness/similarity/equality, and a set of qualities... The first, the specification of the entities between which the relationship pertains, is by no means unproblematic. Establishment of such a relationship requires that the two entities involved be, in some way, comparable... The second component of the concept, the idea of likeness/sameness/similarity/equality, is also potentially problematic, though here the problem is of a slightly different nature. In fact, there are actually two specific aspects to the problem of sameness for the purposes of it: its nature and its degree... Sameness is a scalar concept... If two (or more) entities can be compared, and if sameness is defined as the presence of a specific quality, then for many qualities it may be shown that different entities possess those qualities in varying degrees. The third component of the concept of equivalence which can be, and has been, the focus of conceptual debate is the quality in terms of which the sameness is defined (1997:209-210).

I think that this is an excellent statement of the problem. And I also think that García Landa’s model lays the ground for a satisfactory definition of translational equivalence: Whatever the nature or degree of formal similarity between them, a reverbalisation (in the case of translation, in another language) can be said to be equivalent to its respective original or to another reverbalisation if it helps ensure LPIo/LPCi identity with similar processing effort (a necessary relevance-based addition that will make room for degrees of equivalence). Now, as we have seen, LPIo/LPCi identity in and of itself is neither sufficient nor necessary for mediation to be adequate. My development of García Landa’s model allows us also to develop the concept of translational equivalence into that of mediational adequateness: Equivalence becomes adequate only if it helps bring about the intended metarepresentations and qualitative side effects produced on the basis of speech comprehension (the © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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contextual effects intended by the mediator, themselves subject to analysis and criticism): A reverbalisation (in the case of interlingual mediation, in another language) is said to be adequate if it helps ensure relevant LPIo/LPCi identity. The corollary is that a reverbalisation may be more or less equivalent to an original one or than another reverbalisation, but it can also be more or less adequate than either. This, in turn, allows us to perceive Nida’s dictum about dynamic equivalence and his definition of the closest natural equivalent first with regard to content and then with regard to form in a new light: Ideational identity plus, whenever possible, if possible at all, equivalent or otherwise comparable contextual effects (i.e. ideational and formal adequateness): cognitive - under the guise of metarepresentations, and qualitative - what it feels like to have understood. Unless there is perceptual identity (or, less rigorously, sameness of content) there is no translation, whatever the effects. nontranslation, however, is not synonymous with bad mediation: In their quest for relevant communication, translators qua mediators often resort to not translating. A glaring case in point is that of the myriad translations/adaptations of Swift’s Gulliver’s Travels for children, in which the vitriolic social satire is turned into merry pranks with two out of four travels end completely discarded: the one to Laputa and the, for Swift, most important one, to the Houyhnhnms the noble equines that ruled over those unruly humans, the Yahoos. Nobody in their right mind would take a mediator to task for having omitted those LPIs that do not help relevant identity between what Swift meant his contemporary adult readers to understand and what contemporary children can healthily understand and enjoy. A mediator’s deontologically accountable freedom A professional mediator (whether interlingual or not) is normally pulled by four centrifugal forces. For starters, nowhere is it written that a mediator ought necessarily to be the speaker’s alter ego: He can also be the interlocutor’s - or the commissioner’s. Being an alter ego means adopting the relevant motivations and intentions, speaking from the perspective of whoever means to mean or from that of whoever takes the trouble to understand - i.e. adopting as relevance criteria the metacommunicative interests of either or, in the case of interlingual mediation as a general rule, a compromise between them. As we can see, this does not have so far any necessary consequences for the fidelity to the original utterance or text. Loyalty toward the speaker’s motivations and intentions may well advise or demand departing from an LPIo. And, obviously, so can loyalty to the interlocutor or the commissioner. But, above all, there is the profession itself, to which, as any other professional, a mediator owes supreme loyalty65. The profession, through its specific deontology, represents the more general interests of society. In the vast or narrow scene in which he is called upon to act, 65

See, for instance, Chesterman (1995), Hermans (1991) and Pym (1992a and b).

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there is no “x” telling the mediator where to stand once and for all. Between the lips (or pen) of the speaker, the ears (or eyes) of the mediator’s interlocutor, the interest (more often than not less than enlightened) of the commissioner who pays him, and the deontological norms of the profession there is, always, a space within which a mediator is to exercise his accountable freedom - even if he does not wish to exercise it or is afraid of exercising it. These four points (that can be conflated into three, whenever the commissioner is either the speaker or the interlocutor) delimit such freedom. To transgress them is, by definition, to act unethically or, at best, incompetently. It is the mediator who decides, each time, what counts as relevant identity between meaning as meant by the speaker and as understood by his interlocutor in the second speech act. It is true that sometimes -many fewer than so many believe- the commissioner requests or demands a certain kind of mediation, but it is always up to the mediator to accept or reject this imposition or, often, at least to make his own expert opinion prevail. Not any more or less than a physician, a lawyer, an architect, or any other socially acknowledged professional. A special paragraph must be devoted to the mediator who acts on his own initiative, as has traditionally been the case of the translation of literary, philosophic or religious texts. When a mediator translates because he damn well pleases, of course, he has total freedom to translate as he damn well pleases. Nobody forces or asks the translator to adapt or fail to adapt, to manipulate his text more or less66. But let it be clear that, in these instances, there is no real professional exercise or, therefore, professional deontology: The mediator’s ethics is precisely that - ethics pure and simple. Itself, the fact of translating may be considered heretical (as was the case with Luther); where is the heretic’s deontology? In such cases, the mediator translates out of his own motivation and intentions, freely -sometimes even arbitrarily- choosing what counts as relevant LPIo/LPCi identity. As always, of course, one thing is to choose the kind of relevant identity and a very different one to be able to manage it. We shall see it most glaringly in the last chapter. A door wide open for research My development of García Landa’s model opens wide, I am convinced, all doors at once. Here are, all jumbled, some possible avenues: - The type of identity (i.e. the notions and implementations of equivalence and adequateness) deemed relevant for different text types, readerships or situations, both synchronically and diachronically, according to different 66

Even though, often, the editor ends up imposing his own criterion, it is still a fact that the non-proletarised literary translator enjoys much more freedom than his mercenary colleagues. This is, I submit, the reason that literary translation theoreticians have basically refused to step across the boundaries of antiseptic description. © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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schools, individual translators or originators, both by level of training and experience or theoretical outlook. - Professional, product or expectancy norms, individual, social or institutional, trough time and across space and cultures. - The practical implications of the unnatural values of tm+n in both consecutive and simultaneous interpretation (respectively too high and too low). - The transmutation of LPIo into LPIi (i.e. the clockwork in the mediator’s notorious “black box”). - The way Z determines W, W determines Yy, Yy determines LPIo, and LPIo determines Fo and vice versa (i.e. the relationship between psychological impulse, motivation, intention, thought, speech and language in the speaker). - The way Z determines U, U determines LPCo, and LPCo determines Aa and vice versa (i.e. the same relationship in the subject of comprehension). - The way K, P, M determine speech production and comprehension (i.e. the role of the extralinguistic hermeneutic package). - The kind of competence required to activate different -even “imperfect”Ls, Xs, Ss and Js that counts as active professional knowledge of a language. - The kind of representation of different -even “imperfect”- Ls, Xs, Ss and Js that is assimilated or equated to the passive professional knowledge of a language. - The ability to “second guess” the speaker’s LPo[Fo] (i.e. when the value of n in tm+n is negative). - The transmutation of LPo[Fo] into LP[CE] (i.e. “deverbalisation”) in note taking for consecutive interpretation. - The development of the neurophysiological ability to cope with the unnaturally short tm+n span in simultaneous interpreting. - The interplay between F, C and E (i.e. syntactico-semantically encoded meaning, and paralinguistic and kinetic configuration) in interpretation. - The interplay between F, C and E (i.e. syntactico-semantically encoded meaning, and typographic and graphic configuration) in translation. - The influence of C and E on constrained translation (dubbing, subtitling, simultaneous interpretation, etc.) - The importance of Cn in media interpretation. - The development of communicative and mediating prowess (i.e. the ability to establish and produce relevant identity) from natural translators to professional mediators in view of the mismatches between the original and the new GPM and, in general, the hermeneutic package and disposition on the part of the new readership/audience and the asymmetrical power relations between interlocutors. 114

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- The importance of the originator’s -or the censor’s- WZ, Yy and UZ as the major element in the mediator’s brief. - The need to sensitise users’ UZ to the mediators’ professional judgement (i.e. the struggle to modernise expectancy norms and, therefore, for the professional, social and eventually financial advancement of translation). - The application of the model to different kinds of mediating practice, including interpretation for the deaf (in which either Fo or Fi or both are a) non-acoustic and b) both linear and spatial). - The way the different components of the model have been handled explicitly or implicitly by different translators and thinkers. - The more precise empirical verification and conceptual definition of the symbolised components (for instance, what is the relationship between an LP’s ideational and emotive moments). - Ways to enrich, refine and, if need be, supersede the model itself. I am sure that you will think of many more. Be my guest! As García Landa says, ideas do not belong to those who have them but to those who use them. Personally, I dare think that the model can serve as an apt unified framework for socio-historic as well as neurophysiological research. The result of such research would be, I dare hope, not an infirmation of the model but its further dialectical development in order for it efficiently to encompass, account for and weigh every single relevant factor – every single constitutive rule of the language game called interlingual mediation and its main subtype - translation.

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CHAPTER II THE SPECIFICITY OF INTERLINGUAL MEDIATION Second Lord - He must think us some band of strangers i’ the adversary’s entertainment. Now he hath a smack of all neighbouring languages; therefore we must every one be a man of his own fancy, not to know what we speak one to another; so we seem to know, is to know straight our purpose: chough’s language, gabble enough, and good enough. As for you, interpreter, you must seem very politic1. William Shakespeare, All’s Well That Ends Well, Act IV, Scene I.

All that translators do is not translation As serendipity would have it, as I was editing this chapter I chanced upon the following parallel texts. The first one I found in the parking lot of Ottawa’s Conference Centre: Unauthorized vehicles will be towed away Les véhicules non autorisés sera remorqué at owner’s risk and expense [sic!] aux risques et frais du propriétaire

As can be observed, barring the glaring grammatical mistake, both signs interpretively resemble each other so much that it is difficult to determine which is the original (in all probability the more correct English, but who really knows?). In any event, and again barring the obvious mistake, this is an archetypical case of translation if there ever was one. The next case is more instructive. It is to be found on a cruise boat used for short excursions on the Ottawa River around Canada’s capital city: CHILD SAFETY XXX BOAT LINES WILL NOT BE HOLD RESPONSIBLE FOR UNATTENDED CHILDREN. ASSIST YOUR CHILD DURING THE CRUISE AND WHEN BOARDING AND DISEMBARKING. KEEP A WATCHFUL EYE DURING THE CRUISE. THANK YOU

PROTECTION DES ENFANTS NOUS VOUS PRIONS DE SURVEILLER VOS ENFANTS EN TOUT TEMPS, SURTOUT DURANT L’EMBARQUEMENT ET LE DÉBARQUEMENT. XXX BOAT LINES N’ACCEPTE AUCUNE RESPONSABILITÉ AUPRÉS [sic] DES ENFANTS LAISSES SANS SURVEILLANCE. MERCI

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An interpretive version of the French sign would read: Protection of Children We ask you to watch your children at all times, especially upon boarding and disembarking. XXX Boat Lines do not accept any responsibility for children left unattended. Thank you.

There are notable differences between these two texts that go beyond sheer explicitness: First and foremost, whilst the French sign thematises children’s safety, its English counterpart thematises the company’s exoneration from liability. Pragmatically, the English text can be more or less paraphrased as ‘Listen, if something should happen to your little brats, don expect us to pay for it; so if you care about them, you better watch them, OK?’ whilst the French sign conveys something more like ‘Please take care of your kiddies, because if something untoward should happen to them, we cannot, alas!, take responsibility’ - some hell of a difference! Now, the legal culture and system to which both groups of potential addressees belong are the same (it is, after all, one, if bilingual, country) and, moreover, the relevant urban area itself (Ottawa+Hull) strides English-speaking Ontario and French-speaking Quebec, so that the signs are not really addressing two culturally compartmentalised readerships, the question thus arises as to why the respective authors (or the translator producing the second text) chose to shift pragmatic emphasis. Another difference is in the French ‘surtout,’ which, again, stresses, as it were, the humanitarian bent of the sign. Needless to say, I have no idea whether either of the texts served as original (if so, then probably the English one, since the company’s name appears in English in both texts), or whether its counterpart was arrived at through translation. On the one hand, the differences look too “arbitrary” whatever the hypothesised direction. In other words, the texts do not resemble each other enough interpretively to be the work of a “translator.” But then, on the other, how did these two texts come about? By spontaneous parallel generation? It is even less probable. My personal bet is that one of them was produced by a translator bent, not on “translating,” but on producing, precisely, a parallel text resembling the original in its two main purposes (to advise and to warn), but with a markedly different pragmatic orientation. In any event, if the second text was arrived at by a translator who, for justified or unjustified pragmatic reasons, decided consciously somewhat to depart from interpretive use, then what did he do? The answer is simple: he chose to mediate actively. This is what our forefathers, Vinay and Darbelnet, could not see back then, and went the convoluted way of abstracting and describing all manner of linguistic procedures to explain post mortem a phenomenon that has no relevant linguistic explanation whatsoever.

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The third case is a sign to be found at Heathrow airport: TO TALK TO CUSTOMS LIFT UP THE RECEIVER SI DESEA HABLAR CON LA DIRECCIÓN DE ADUANAS (CUSTOM’S EXCISE OFFICE) ALCE EL AURICULAR Y UN OFICIAL LE ATENDERÁ [If you wish to speak to the Customs Directorate (Custom’s Excise Office) lift up the receiver and an official will talk to you]

These are very different texts: The Spanish version is much more explicit (as is the French one below it), presumably because its intended addressees are not familiar with the UK ways. As the one before, instances such as this are rife and merit no special attention, other than for the fact that the Spanish (and French) signs were certainly produced by translators, who, according to Gutt’s definition, chose not to translate but to come up with a presumably more functional (i.e. more relevant) sign for foreign travellers arriving in Britain. Here, mediation is both active and open. A definition of translation as sheer second-degree interpretive use does not help in explaining this instance. Indeed, this translator did something more than interpret: he chose to describe on his own. From the standpoint of relevance theory, mediation (whether interlingual or not) would thus initially appear as a synthesis of both uses. The mediator will privilege either pole according to his assessment of global optimal relevance not so much of his utterance, but of the totality of his speech act and its social consequences as assessed on the basis of the cognitive and qualitative effects of his mediation on his addressee(s), the client, the original speaker, and whoever may have a legitimate claim on his loyalty, including his peers and, generally, the profession itself. Since the mediated speech act is always induced by the original act, this relevance, of course, will be mainly a function of the propositional content of the original or of the cognitive and qualitative effects sought and/or actually achieved through it in the original addressees in the original situation - mainly, indeed, but never solely or wholly. One of the main practical problems with translation is that in the original speech act the speaker, in conceiving and/or formulating his LPIo, imposes upon himself certain more or less relevant formal constraints. These constraints can be related to the social norms governing the specific type of act (a legal document, a casual encounter, and academic gathering, a love letter) and will linguistically reflect themselves mostly as conforming to them. In other words, Fo will be consequently marked at different levels. If a translation is to be both homoscopic and homofunctional, this poses two sets of potential problems: 1) the way the target culture norms relevantly affect the new speech act; 2) the kinds of marking that cannot, may not, should not or must be introduced into the new Fi; and 3) the kinds of relevant marks that the target language prevents or of

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“undesirable” ones it imposes2. This is very clearly obvious in the case of legal translation. Given the formal differences in stylistic conventions and the noetic differences in legal concepts, how is, say, a British law to be translated into Spanish: transparently, covertly, domesticatedely, communicatively following the target language conventions or murkily, overtly, foreignisingly, semantically following insofar as possible the source culture conventions with target language marks? And even if the source conventions are discarded in favour of the target ones, what about the noetic differences between, say, murder, assassination, manslaughter and homicide as different legal concepts specific to the English language and Common Law, and asesinato and homicidio which are the two lexicalised concepts in both the Spanish language and Roman Law? In most cases, this kind of problems is relatively easily solved, or at least palliated, since noetic content is always verbalisable -if often not economically or idiomatically- whatever the language, whilst conventions are only noticeable when they are flouted. The fact that all manner of legal and other conventionally marked acts of oral and written speech get successfully -i.e. relevantlytranslated every day should be, I submit, sufficient proof of the more or less universal translatability of more or less all pragmatic utterances. The real translation problems appear when the formal trappings of Fo acquire additional, non-propositional, non-noetic value, i.e. when the qualitative, phenomenal content of what is being expressed is foregrounded, and such foregrounding is managed through the specific marking of Fo. Because, invariably, the new language will not offer the same, or even equivalent marking possibilities, and because there is no systematic correspondence with any particular kind of marking and the qualia relevantly communicated. Those qualia, which I have subsumed under contextual effects, become particularly sensitive when they are the product of aesthetic perception - the perception, as it were, of the qualitative features of F. If communication, and therefore translation, always is to speak in order to say something, to communicate an LPI, it is also to speak in a certain way, in accordance with or with reference to certain conventional and/or individual aims, and this entails automatically specific kinds and degrees of marking at all levels. These social conventions manifest themselves in different kinds of constraints, as those having to do with the power relations between the interlocutors (governing, for instance, the use of social distance markers such as pronominal forms in the second person in Germanic, Romance and Slavic languages). The greater the specific weight of the noetic content, the lesser the specific weight of formal marking and vice versa. There are cases where, outside the wider limitations of register, marking is totally irrelevant, and there are cases where marking is the very name of the game. In everyday exchanges with family, friends, colleagues and other fellow human beings, the minutiae of 2

As was the case with Security Council Resolution 242.

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marking are irrelevant. In most speech acts to be professionally translated (of necessity more formal than everyday exchanges), the sheer need to covey an LPI across the linguistic and cultural barrier necessitates more attention to (N.B. more attention to, not more imitation of) marking if mediation is to be pragmatically effective. In pragmatically loaded speech acts, marking can be of the essence. Advertising comes immediately to mind: Any effective advertisement must be catchy, and catchiness is a qualitative phenomenon that will depend on a myriad formal elements (including, most notably, first-degree percepts, such as, image, colour and, generally, graphic design), rather than on propositional content alone. If homoscopy and homofunctionality are of the essence, effective mediation must make prevail these qualitative aspects over propositional content, and that is why it is often asserted (and rightly so) that advertisements cannot be translated. Indeed, when it comes to this kind of ultranoetic mediation, García Landa’s model -after all, a model of translation- is totally powerless. Now if “translating” a simple five- or six-word ad becomes a mediating problem, what about a poem? Translation as a modality of interlingual mediation We had seen that insofar as it limits itself to describing the necessary ingredients of speech in general and of translational speech in particular, as well as the indispensable conditions for communication to succeed spontaneously, García Landa’s model of speech communication proper provides us with a solid basis for understanding direct intended sense - i.e. noetic meaning officially meant. By focussing exclusively on the perquisites of speech production and comprehension at the perceptual level, however, it leaves out the metacommunicative factors determining every act of communication and, therefore, translation and mediation. In real life these metacommunicative and metaperceptual factors -motivations, pragmatic intentions, interest in or resistance to understanding, and effects of comprehension- provide a decisive frame for speech production and comprehension at the macro level. A speech act, in other words, is but a moment in the relationship between two human beings that has a history behind and consequences after. So that by distinguishing between the perceptual and the postperceptual, as well as between the communicative and the metacommunicative levels, and by introducing these inescapable subjective elements, I have transformed García Landa’s general model of speech production and comprehension into a more general model of human communication through speech. This is essential if we want to discuss translation practically, since in actual reality there is no such thing as prototypical translation: Every act of translation is, at the same time, an act of mediation. The translator’s transparency, no matter how desirable in certain politically delicate contexts, is a myth: Translators are human beings who cannot help bringing to their own actions -including their speech acts, and, more © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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specifically, their speech acts qua professional mediators- their subjectivity, history, emotions, ideology, tastes, preferences, likes and dislikes. They may have a professional duty to speak “as if” they were totally impartial, whatever their personal views or feelings, and they may succeed at preventing them from standing in the way of their professional performance, but they cannot stop being the human beings they are. In this respect, they share the boat with psychoanalysts, judges, detectives and other professionals who must strive for absolute objectivity and impartiality. Indeed, behind every act of mediation there is, first and foremost, the persona of the mediator, and the mediator is a complex subjective prism, not a pellucid glass pane. He too understands and speaks on the basis of relevance - he cannot possibly do otherwise, because he too is a product of evolution and natural selection. What he can -and now that the insight is available, should- do is become aware of it and put it to efficient professional use: He can and must ponder how relevance may be at work in the case of the speaker and of the different interlocutors - direct and indirect, co-present or absent, present or future. Most especially, of course, he must ponder how relevance may be at work with his own interlocutors: he cannot mediate effectively otherwise, wherever his loyalties may lie. If he is working for the speaker, then he can only mediate on his behalf if he is attuned to the possible mismatches between relevance for him and the people he is trying to communicate with. The same applies if he is working for the interlocutor(s). And the same applies if he is working for a third party. If all we have as a translational criterion is LPIo/LPCi identity, we can, true, distinguish translation from everything else, but we are powerless to assess degrees of success, i.e. of metacommunicative relevance - and therefore of translational quality. Any number of methods and strategies, any number of different actual translations can ensure LPIo/LPCi identity in a given situation or hosts of situations. Are they all equally valid? Not any more than the different methods and strategies to re-create Beethoven’s Ninth, let alone each different performance thereof. Some differences, of course, must be more relevant than others in some contexts - but which, where, why? If in order for speech -and translation- to succeed there must exist a shared and activated wealth of linguistic and encyclopaedic knowledge, of precomprehension schemes and passing theories (i.e. a shared and activated exponential field or hermeneutic package, with all its systems LHRQ and PMK) governed by a sufficient degree of mutual orientedness Z, it is obvious that, contrario sensu, whenever these different kinds of knowledge are not shared sufficiently or at all, or whenever the participants are not adequately “attuned” to each other, speech communication as described in García Landa’s model becomes progressively more difficult or even impossible. These hermeneutic and, above all, psychological discrepancies are rife in monolingual communication and even more so when communication is mediated and interlingual. Luckily, in most circumstances these insufficiencies can be 122

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remedied. All that is required is that at least one of the interlocutors understand that a) communication will not succeed or is not succeeding, b) in which part of the exponential field lies the problem: whether in K, P or M, or even in the different components of the linguistic system (as is normally the case when there are all too marked dialectal and sociolectal differences between speakers of the “same” language), or, c) failing that, whether the problem lies in an insufficient degree of mutual orientedness Z. It happens every day: We speak assuming that our interlocutor both knows enough and is willing enough to produce on the basis of our FCE an LPC identical to our LPI, and sometime afterward (because of his expression, feedback, or the very development of the conversation) we understand that he has not understood. At times, such comprehension of incomprehension happens much later, even too late; at other times it never materialises and we go to our graves perfectly happy that we have understood or that we have made ourselves understood. The same thing happens when we are spoken to and we are the ones who understand that we have not understood (and that our interlocutor does not see it), and we take ourselves the initiative to ask for clarifications. In both cases, the remedy lies either in establishing a sufficiently shared hermeneutic package, or in overcoming our own inadequate orientedness or helping our interlocutor to overcome his. Cognitively, this can be achieved in two ways: a) by simplifying or modifying the originally necessary exponential field (speaking in simpler terms, accommodating the encyclopaedic and linguistic lacunae or the psychological and cultural idiosyncrasy of our interlocutor), and/or b) by enriching his hermeneutic package - which is, by the way, what the translator’s prologues and footnotes do. Pragmatically, the thing becomes more complex: It is hard enough to work on one’s own psychological black box; helping fix someone else’s is an even trickier proposition. Basically, however, it can all be explained in relevancetheoretical terms: We must strive to accept our interlocutor’s (mostly unconscious) concept of relevance despite our own (as we do when we patiently listen to a child’s rambling story), or try and attune ours to his (as we do when we realise that our interlocutor shows signs of boredom, irritation or whatever pragmatic effect we do not want to have upon him). At the noetic level, then, normally the responsibility of the speaker is to become more explicit, i.e. to transfer more of the LPI elements from the implicature to the syntacticosemantic explicature or to articulate Fo with particular attention to the choice of lexemes and syntactic constructions, register and elocution - for instance, when speaking to a foreigner who does not know the language well, or to a child, or to a less knowledgeable or sophisticated adult3. The interlocutor’s responsibility, on his part, is to make clear that he has 3

Needless to point out, the reverse is equally possible: Our interlocutor’s hermeneutic package is much more refined than we estimate and we are giving him much more information than he needs. The same applies to any information that our interlocutor has no interest whatsoever in processing. Our responsibility as speakers, in this case, is to become less explicit. There is a © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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not understood or is not sure to have understood properly. I insist on the fact that either procedure cannot but be governed by a conscious and, above all, unconscious predisposition to cooperate in order to achieve mutual understanding (and that is why I have used the same symbol Z at either end of the speech act). The big hurdle comes when on either side the problems with orientedness are unconscious, because insofar as they cannot be consciously accessed, they cannot be consciously addressed either. Other things being equal, of course, as is usually the case with any act of ostensive communication, the speaker bears the main responsibility for communicative success, since he is the one with access to his LPI (i.e. he is the first one to understand what he means), and, moreover, he is the one who chooses both to initiate the speech act and the semiotic stimulus; but, as we know all too well, other things can be most unequal. In many other cases, the main responsibility falls on the more skilful communicator, who is not necessarily the one with the most knowledge or wielding more power. In the case of the physician and his patient or the mother and her child, it is normally the first of each pair who manages communication. But it need not be so: the more skilful communicators can be the patient or the child. When speaking of the more skilful communicator, the emphasis is displaced from the precomprehension schemes and shared knowledge to the psychological disposition and ability to understand and make oneself understood. Whenever for objective or subjective, cognitive or emotive reasons both interlocutors cannot understand each other, the only remedy is the bridge of a mediator who provides, on the one hand, his greater ability and disposition to understand either of them, and, on the other, his greater ability and disposition to make himself understood by either of them. When predisposition to understand or to make oneself understood vanishes altogether, when the animosity is such that no conscious effort will be more powerful than unconscious emotions, when there isn’t even an iota of symmetrical Z at either end of the speech act, direct communication becomes impossible, no matter how shared the hermeneutic package. There, either a mediator steps in or communication fails. If the barrier is not too insurmountable, any friend or even a passer by who is not emotively tainted can do the job. But when the hurdles are also cultural, encyclopaedic and whatnot, what is needed is a professional mediator: one whose job it is, precisely, to remedy or, at least, palliate such discrepancies. In different circumstances, the professional mediator can be anybody from the foreign minister of a third country to a community worker. The dialogue that husband

fundamental difference, however: Superfluous or parasitic information is indeed a nuisance, but it does not necessarily hamper noetic understanding. In any event, our responsibility as cooperative speakers is to see always to the maximum relevance of what we say, and, as interlocutors, to make it clear in a pragmatically effective way when whoever is speaking to us does not quite manage it. 124

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and wife can no longer hold directly can be managed by a marriage councillor or, at worst, can be maintained by their respective lawyers. Whenever to these objective or subjective, cognitive or emotive reasons the fact is added that the interlocutors do not even speak the same language, let alone understand each other, then the professional mediator must be both interlingual and intercultural - in a word, us. The interlocutors need an interlingual mediator because they do not sufficiently share the LHRQ components of the hermeneutic package: either they speak different languages, or the speaker speaks a lect that his interlocutor cannot understand (which is the same, practically and theoretically). Indeed, unintelligibility may arise out of a lectal variety: the physician may need the mother in order to understand the child and make him understand; a British lawyer may need a Caribbean colleague’s mediation to understand or get across to a Jamaican peasant. If the only mismatch between the interlocutors is the linguistic exponential field (say, between physicians wishing to discuss medical problems but lacking a common language), García Landa’s model is enough. As a matter of fact, his model (as Seleskovitch’s interpretive theory, which it explains) is empirically based on his experience as a conference interpreter. No wonder; at international conferences, there tend to be no substantive cultural and encyclopaedic mismatches among participants: as a rule, they are all international diplomats or experts or civil servants, sharing the same “conference culture” (whence the insightful idea of a microworld), with no real differences in social power. All they need is someone to ensure LPIo/LPCi identity across their respective languages - which is why many clients do not appreciate the extreme difficulty of simultaneous interpreting: they believe that it is all a matter of substituting Fi for Fo. By comparison to that of any other mediator -most notably the literary translator and the dialogue interpreter- the mediating role of a conference interpreter (and most especially in the simultaneous mode) is almost nil - almost, but not quite. Actually, this is how translation has naively been seen and is still seen from the clients’ lay eyes or from the theoretically obsolete concept of so many practitioners who, nevertheless, know their languages and terminology to the hilt. A considerable number of conference interpreters see it just that way, unaware that, no matter how important, the linguistic barrier is never the only one standing in the way of efficient (i.e optimally relevant), as opposed to merely effective, communication. In other words, if objective and subjective, cognitive or emotive conditions between the interlocutors are symmetrical enough, and all they need is a common language but do not have it, direct, simple, prototypical translation, with almost zero mediation, is, in principle, sufficient - sufficient, indeed, but almost never optimally relevant. Statistically speaking, however, such cases are most rare: For all its visibility and prestige, conference interpreting at strictly political or even specialised international institutions, such as the International

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Atomic Energy Agency, represents a minute fraction of all mediated events4. Even at the most rarefied and formal diplomatic encounter, translation is always mediation, since, as García Landa points out, communication is not addressed by the abstract speaker in a model to an abstract interlocutor, but by a flesh-andbone human being to another, in an all too real situation. Of course, any normal monolingual speaker with a “natural” ability to speak (i.e. a social ability, socially acquired together with speech, but that soon becomes part of his “nature”) also has a “natural” psychological ability to mediate. It follows, therefore, that any normal bilingual speaker will have a “natural” ability to mediate interlingually. This is exactly what Harris (1992) and Toury (1998) point out. The problem is that between this “natural” ability and the one professionally required there is a distance that can only be spanned by dint of learning and practice on the basis of a sound theoretical understanding of the phenomenon in hand. As Dejéan Le-Féal (1987) so rightly comments, the “natural” bilingual can only mediate effectively in his “natural” environment, not, for instance, at big international conferences, or in court, or in any other professional event. Even a cultivated bilingual -say, an architect- can be an incompetent mediator outside his sophisticated “natural” environment, outside the ensemble of microworlds with which he is familiar; for instance, if he should have to mediate between an illiterate refugee and an ignorant, obtuse and bullying police officer. The “natural” bilingual, who, to boot, faces the need to attend to syntacticosemantic articulation, register and elocution in two different lects of two different languages finds himself in even stormier waters especially if at stake is the immediate and irreparable lot of a vulnerable human being (a responsibility that I, as a professional conference interpreter of thirty years, have never had to face - not even once). Every time hermeneutic and heuristic asymmetry becomes evident, and especially as soon as the scales tip more towards one interlocutor or the other, prototypical translation is not enough: it becomes necessary to mediate more or less actively. This inalienable aspect of translation as an activity that is not only interlingual, but intercultural and mediating, is particularly hidden to staff interpreters of organisations such as the United Nations, where participants evince exceptionally symmetrical ability and disposition to make themselves understood and to understand. Even so, when the representatives of the “native” peoples of our planet come to have their voices heard at the meetings of the SubCommittee on Minorities of the Human Rights Committee, UN interpreters 4

For reasons of social prestige, it is simultaneous interpreting -and then at international organisations- that has hitherto tended to be the yardstick and standard bearer. It is understandable, of course, as it is understandable that most murder mysteries take place among the landed gentry, but as there are many and more typical crimes committed in the shanty towns of the Third World than in the manors of the First, there are many more typical cases of mediation outside the Palais des Nations and the European Parliament than there are inside. 126

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witness the -for the UN- strange spectacle of a marked social and power asymmetry between these speakers and the well-heeled diplomats and civil servants at the other end of the room. Spanish interpreters, as a case in point, either mediate actively or communication fails, since many of their clients can only understand -and sometimes barely- their own socio-dialectal variety of Spanish. Often there is a chasm between the cultivated, nay, opaque language that some of the diplomats speak and the half-baked stammering of many of the representatives of these indigenous nations who are forced to speak a language they hardly know (the Lapps from Sweden and Finland, for instance, must speak English, and many Latin-American Mayas, Collas, Mapuches or Guaranis must speak Spanish although it is not their native language). And then there is another chasm between the hermeneutic ability of the representative of the Guatemalan Mayas and that of the Guatemalan Ambassador or the Cuban expert - even though they all speak through and listen to the same interpretation. This heterogeneous gamut of abilities and dispositions to understand makes it very difficult to find a common denominator and, therefore, an FiCn such that will be understood by everybody without putting anybody off. The importance of the paralinguistic configuration C cannot be overstressed. Interpreters are talking to someone who has difficulty in understanding “standard” Spanish: We must articulate very clearly and slowly. Since most interventions are at machine-gun speed (speakers have only five minutes to greet, thank and express all of their claims and grievances), the only way we can make ourselves effectively understood is by condensing and simplifying the explicature as a function of relevance for his audience - by saying it short, clear and basic (as we would in consecutive, by the way). There is no time for anything else. No “natural” linguistic or social ability will allow this to be done efficiently. Plunged all of a sudden in a milieu that is not our “natural” environment, we, UN interpreters, used to mediating among elegant diplomats, experts and civil servants, at times do not realise that the rules of the game have changed and that we must now play it differently. Without resorting to such extreme examples, many staff interpreters, such as I, who have no other experience than the conference rooms of the Headquarters building in New York or at the Vienna International Centre, would take long to recover from their befuddlement at the enormous variety of conference multilingual communication5 that can exist in real life. Think only of the Tribunals for Genocide in Rwanda and Crimes in the Ex-Yugoslavia, the Lockerbie trial or the moving and revealing experience of South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission, at which the torturers and the tortured, the murderers and the victims’ relatives are trying to understand and reconcile with each other. A 5

I am referring, may I repeat, to conference interpreting. At times, UN interpreters must accompany peace-keeping missions, visits by human rights experts, etc. where they mediate dialogically. Unfortunately, this is an experience I personally lack, and a huge hole in my direct vision of the profession which I have had to palliate vicariously. © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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different story is that of the variegated context of European institutions, or, even more so, of the International Labour Office, where representatives of the ruling classes (dare I call them capitalists?) and of the workers meet under the presumably impartial auspices of the Governments and of the Secretariat to lubricate class struggle. But not even here is communication so alive, varied and personally engrossing as in the much more typical professional life of the socalled community interpreter6. If García Landa’s model of translation, based on his model of the speech act, is a product of his experience as a simultaneous interpreter, the development thereof that I am propounding here comes from the global practice of interlingual communication, from an interview between an asylum-seeker and an immigration officer to the translation of a sonnet by Shakespeare7. Therein, I submit, lies its universality - that is why I dare call mine a general theory of interlingual mediation: That I know of, it encompasses, describes and explains each and every act of interlingual mediation and clearly delimits interlingual mediation from all other activities. May I stress that the model is purely descriptive, as is biology, which describes the human being and the maladies that afflict it. As a praxis, on the other hand, mediation is more akin to applied medicine, in that it is the heuristic application of descriptive knowledge with a view to overcoming a specific pathology: the impossibility of direct communication. The description of a pathology is indeed indispensable in order to find and apply an effective solution. However, mediating speech, as a therapy to the pathology that is in-communication, cannot stop at description: Pathologies are not cured just by having been identified, described and understood - even if they become visible only from and with respect to a theory that describes them. Nor is it enough impartially to look at and describe what practitioners actually do, because even if they all did exactly the same (which they do not), it still would not necessarily mean that they are doing the most effective thing. Bell says it brilliantly: “Would it be true that individual lawyers or doctors are ‘mere objects of study’ by legal or medical specialists? Translators are practitioners just as lawyers and doctors are” (Bell 2001:157).

It is therefore not enough simply to describe and explain the world of mediated interlingual communication: It is high time to help develop and improve it by determining and fostering the best possible practical approaches. Specifically, the pedagogy of mediating speech aims to allow and promote that a student a) detect all problems as quickly as possible, and b) understand them 6

See Wadensjö (1993,1995, and 1998) and all others in my bibliography, most particularly Roy (2000), Valero Garcés and others (2003), and Bot (2003). 7

Not that I can boast in most of them anything resembling relevant experience, unfortunately... but then, who can? 128

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ever better - i.e. by skilfully applying adequate descriptive methods- in order to c) rapidly determine the best way to solve them within the relevant objective and subjective circumstances, and d) apply more effectively that better way - i.e. by following adequate, scientifically arrived at normative and even prescriptive criteria. Since it is a matter of distinguishing adequate or more efficient from less efficient or inadequate practice, pedagogy cannot but advise for or against such or such other methods to solving the problems faced by mediation, practitioners and students. ‘Do it right!’ or ‘Do it better!’ are injunctions or suggestions that can only make sense within a theory that allows to explain why that other way is wrong or worse. So that, without apostatising from the descriptive nature of my development of García Landa’s model, this section, as it treads upon the reality of interlingual mediation, will depart from ontology and description to become normative. Interlingual mediation as something more (or less) than translation Interlingual mediation as more than translation Much has been said about losses in translation, but little about gains. I am not referring just to those instances in which the mediator adds information in order to make up for a presumably defective hermeneutic package in his intended interlocutor(s), as was the case with the Heathrow announcement, but to taking advantage of the possibilities offered by the target language and/or the new situations in order to “add value” to the text. Such gains are more the province of mediation than of translation proper, since they are seldom “induced” by the original. Once upon a time, I was commissioned to translate a brochure for a key ring cum remote control device that allowed the user to lock or unlock his car at a distance, whereupon the car lights would start flashing (a feature that was a novelty back then). The sales pitch was more safety than comfort, and the typical situation exploited was that of a dark and lonely parking lot late at night. Rather than looking for the car and then fumbling for the keys and then trying to fit the key in the hole, a lady could have the car tell her where it was and wait for her with its lights on and doors unlocked. The translation posed no problems at all. But I realised I had a golden opportunity to get back at English and take advantage of the fact that Spanish does not distinguish safety from security, so I added a title of my own: “Está seguro?” (which can be interpreted both as “Are you sure?” and “Are you safe?”). Perhaps not all too surprisingly, the commissioner hesitated to present his client with such an “unfaithful” translation, but I prevailed upon him. Needless to say, the client was delighted: in that particular respect the Spanish ad turned out to be more effective than the original English - for once, the target language proved more “suited” than the source language. It is not, of course, a matter of the source language being by definition more suited to the communicative purposes in hand than the target language, but that, as Slobin explains, the author, as any other speaker in any other language in any other situation, verbalises his direct intended sense using © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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the specific means specifically offered by his language, which, of necessity, will be different from those offered the translator by the target language. Interlingual mediation as less than translation A typical case is that of translation constrained by a limited space (news item, titles, epigraphs and whatnot). It is common knowledge that English is more concise than Spanish and that, therefore, the same “semantic” information takes up more space in the latter. The first thing to do in these circumstances is to determine which information to omit altogether. In order to do so, there is no need to ask the client’s leave: a good mediator knows exactly what is negotiable in each specific case. But even in the absence of constraints necessitating greater concision there are many cases in which a good mediator knows that it is not advisable to translate everything, either in order not to impede intended functionality or, ultimately, in order to save the client an unnecessary expense. Relevance is universal and applies fully to all utterances in all situations, including documentary and authoritative texts. Foreign authorities are not interested in processing more information than they require, nor do the fleshand-blood people who will have to take the trouble on their behalf. What they really need is, again, relevant information. A typical case is that of bureaucratic formulae such as “now therefore” or “en cuanto ha lugar y conforme a derecho” [insofar as it is admissible and conforming to the law] that usually lack functionality in a translated text. But there are more delicate cases. At one time, a colleague asked her peers for help in translating the phrase “elegido mejor compañero”, which her client had included in his cv to be translated into English8. The client (if memory serves me right, a young Argentine economist who wished to apply to a postgraduate course at an American university) had stated that he had been chosen “best fellow student” by his fourth-year class. As an experienced American colleague commented privately, a Spanish cv is not an American résumé - they are measured against different acceptability criteria. For a US university this kind of information is not only superfluous but, worse, parasitic, since the sheer fact that an applicant deems it worth mentioning may well end up defeating acceptability by the intended addressee: It is too childish a feather for a professional’s cap. A genuinely professional mediator ought to alert his client, and advise him to suppress this item and leave it to the expert at interlingual mediation to decide what information to enter, how and in what order. If in the above cases omissions are voluntary, in consecutive interpreting the restitution of noetic content can never be complete – which does not stand in the way of success, provided whatever information is lost is not relevant. For other reasons, completeness of noetic reverbalisation may be impossible in simultaneous interpreting. It happens quite often, for example, whenever, in 8

El-Lenguaraz, Forum of the Colegio de Traductores Públicos de Buenos Aires (CTPBA) (e [email protected]), message #39597, 07.25.2001. 130

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order to buttress or illustrate a point or out of sheer vanity, a speaker comes out with a literary quotation. It is difficult enough when the quotation is in prose, but when it is in verse all alarms go on. All that can be demanded of the best professional, even if he has been given the text a few minutes in advance, is a minimally literary version reproducing the macropropositions. If users do not complain it is because, in the specific situation, completeness of content (let alone formal equivalence!) is as impossible as it is irrelevant. And it is irrelevant because, no matter how much it may matter to the speaker, a sensible interlocutor neither demands it nor expects it. If at a political meeting, say a discussion of official development aid, the speaker brings in Calderón: ¿Qué delito cometí Contra vosotros naciendo? Aunque, si nací, ya entiendo qué delito he cometido. Bastante causa han tenido vuestra justicia y rigor pues que el delito mayor del hombre es haber nacido. [What sin have I committed against you by having been born? Though If I was born, I do understand the crime that I have committed. Enough cause have had your justice and rigour, since man’s greatest sin is having been born.]

and our colleague simple converts these six rhymed octosyllables into: As the poet says, “Man’s greatest crime is having been born.”

we can assert that he has mediated perfectly. His interlocutors are aware that the relevant noetic content of the original, which is all that the interpreter can offer them and, almost certainly, all that they themselves can and wish to understand spontaneously and immediately in that instant and at that speed. This prose version is, indeed, much more adequate than any untoward attempt at verbalising the complete noetic content of the monologue, which, bereft of any poetic functionality, lacks any rhetoric functionality as well. Interlingual mediation something other than translation A typical recurring case of mediation as something other than translation is that of titles: where is the meaning identity between À la recherche du temps perdu and Remembrance of Things Past (which is a quotation from Shakespeare)? Movie titles are seldom “translated” - can you guess what Hitchcock films the following back-translated titles refer to? My Secret Damns Me, International Intrigue, Sinister Covenant9. But the most glaring examples are to be found in the “translation” of advertisements. Take this ad for welding-goggles: 9

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The Goggles that Won’t Make a Spectacle of Yourself!

The goggles in question did not look like goggles at all: they were quite similar to regular spectacles, whence the pun. The problem is that the pun cannot be reproduced in Spanish at all. I did not have the model at that time, but my intuition was well placed: I intuitively understood that the correlation between pragmatic intention and the effects of comprehension had to carry the day, whatever the semantic “costs10.” I reasoned that the obvious advantage of the goggles -the manufacturer’s selling pitch- was, precisely, that they did not look like what they actually were, but much better. I embarked then on an independent search: How would I sell them if it had been my job not to translate but to develop a Spanish ad? I’ll spare you the black box noise and give you my end solution: Las gafas protectoras elegantes. [The elegant protecting goggles]

Here, the only remaining linguistic connection lies in “gafas.” I had to choose a “name” for the object that would be readily understood by US Hispanics and throughout the Spanish-speaking world. If the ad had been meant for the Argentine public, I could have safely used “antiparras” or “anteojos” (the former would not have been understood by many US Hispanics, the latter is a dialectal use in the River Plate). I finally decided to put “gafas” (which would make an Argentine or an Uruguayan cringe, but not run away). The play on words being, then, most decidedly untranslatable, I couldn’t find one in Spanish (nor did the meagre compensation make it worth my while). So I chose to convey the same indirect intended sense (“the glasses don’t look at all like goggles”) as laconically and effectively as Spanish and my talent would allow me. The “elegantes” I thought of injecting, needed to make clear that those specific “gafas” were otherwise expected not to be very comely, necessitated an extra marker to distinguish them from regular “glasses.” And thus “protectoras” was caboosed along. None of the choices was “linguistically” motivated by the English text; all of them were imposed or at least suggested by the metacommunicative framework: what my client expected (perhaps even unbeknownst to him) was, in fact, not a translation of “The Glasses That Won’t Make a Spectacle of Yourself” but an effective slogan, based on the same

10

Vuorinen (1995) provides a similar explanation.

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attribute of the referent, for a Spanish ad addressed to Hispanics in the US and possibly abroad11. Here, as you can see, we have exited translation altogether - i.e. there is no LPIo/LPCi identity. This is a typical case where: Yy > (LPI≠ LPCi) → Aa

The model is -that I am aware of- the only one that can explain all these different cases, which is its great advantage, since translators are required to “not translate” very often. This, a machine cannot hope to do (not in the foreseeable future, that is). Convergent, compatible and divergent face At the First Latin American Seminar on Translation and Interpretation held in Buenos Aires in September 1996, Ruth Simcovich, a star Argentine interpreter, told two interesting stories. She is sent to receive an important European ministerial delegation. After the usual formalities, visitors and hosts leave the airport in several limousines. Ruth must accompany the local and visiting ministers’ wives. Despite the screaming sirens, the caravan has difficulty negotiating the dense traffic blocking the 30 odd kilometres separating the airport from the hotel where the visitors will be lodged. The Argentine lady tells her counterpart in her precarious English, ‘Do you know that there is a polo match and we are both invited?’ Her interlocutor replies ‘Is that so? When?’ ‘This very afternoon, at 4:00 p.m.’ ‘At four?’ At this moment, the interpreter, who is sitting next to the driver, confirms her suspicion that neither lady is too keen on going to the field, but neither dares say it first - lest one or the other lose face. She then turns around and asks: ‘Excuse me, but at what time will the match end?’ ‘At seven or so,’ replies the host. ‘Then you will scarcely have time to change clothes and make it to the dinner reception.’ ‘You’re right. In that case perhaps we should skip the polo.’ The interpreter thus intervened on her own to save both her clients’ day and face. This was possible because in this case both interlocutors had convergent face: their social interests and stakes coincided12. It would have been most didactic if the second story had happened that evening between the respective husbands. Alas, apparently it was not so. Anyway, this time around the European and Argentine delegations meet in Buenos Aires to negotiate a momentous agreement. The Argentine Minister says to his counterpart through the interpreter ‘I’m sure you’re all very tired. If you 11

Indeed, the client was not supposed to be aware of all this. This is the professional mediator’s realm, who must assert it in order not only to benefit the client with the most relevant service, but to uphold the profession. 12

For an excellent analysis of negative and positive face in conversation, see Tzanne (1999). © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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wish, we can meet this afternoon.’ To which the European Minister replies ‘You’re most kind. But don’t worry: we’re used to it.’ My fellow citizen insists: ‘Oh no! You must be exhausted, and jet-lagged to boot.’ Which is met with ‘Not at all! We are aware that you must be a very busy man and we would not wish to mess up your schedule.’ It was obvious, says Ruth, that the Argies were as eager to postpone the meeting as the Euros were bent on having it there and then, although (face again, but divergent) neither wanted to put his cards on the table. This time around the interlocutors’ interests and stakes did not match - to help one would have been ipso facto to torpedo the other, so the interpreter limited herself impassibly to organise the traffic of insistences and refusals - in something very much akin to prototypical translation. We can already see the decisive role that face plays in communication, and most especially in mediated communication, where it is basically up to the mediator to guess or determine its nature. For the purposes of effective mediation, I find it useful to distinguish convergent from merely compatible face: The interlocutors’ faces converge when they are both actively interested in the same outcome. In such cases, a mediator can decisively help communication. A typical and endearing case is that of young people who have fallen in love and shyly try to overcome the perceived but ultimately inexistent threatens to their face. A Polish movie comes to mind that I saw ages ago: a collection of short stories about hands. In this particularly touching scene, a young man and a young woman are sitting next to each other at a concert. They do not know each other, but it is obvious that they have been reciprocally smitten. The young man is dying to touch the woman’s hand, and we can also see hers impatiently awaiting his touch. All this is observed by an old man who is sitting directly behind them, next to his wife. Suddenly, he slides his own wrinkled hand between the young people’s seats and swiftly caresses the young man’s hand. The latter’s face is filled with elation and he then boldly “answers back” and grabs the girl’s hand. It is now her turn to blush with happiness. The camera leaves their hands tightly clutched. Now that’s a mediator for you! Short of being convergent, face is nevertheless compatible when the interlocutors’ interests do not necessarily coincide, but are not at odds with each other: The husband suggests going to the movies; his wife would much rather go for a stroll in the park, but she does not want to impose upon him. Except that he could not care less one way or the other, so that his wife’s preference does not threaten his own face - nor would he wish to make her lose hers by refusing. We see that every day when we reassure or seek reassurances that it is OK to do or not do such or such thing. Active and passive mediation If in the first instance mediation was obviously passive, in the Ottawa and London signs above, we were dealing with obviously active mediation. Regardless of how legitimate or felicitous those particular acts are, what makes 134

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active mediation socially acceptable? A mediator will ‘dare’ take it upon himself to let go of interpretive use and squarely assume ‘authorship’ for his translated text or utterance if he is reasonably assured that he will not be stepping on anybody’s pragmatic toes, i.e. when he can confidently assume that the speaker (if available for comment) and/or originator are consciously or unconsciously willing to accommodate the new addressees’ acceptability criteria and ability to understand. The most obvious example is the translation of children’s literature. Defoe and Swift may be writhing in their graves, but Spanish publishers of children’s literature and their hired translators of Robinson Crusoe or Gulliver’s Travels do not give a hoot. Nor do translators of opera libretti, the relevance of which entails optimum singability, or those of commercial comedy films, whose relevance lies squarely in being funny to the target audience. Active mediation is the name of the game wherever interpretive use takes the back seat, and descriptive use either grabs the wheel, or it too is relegated to the rear: active mediation may at times completely disregard both the noetic and the formal features of the original. Let us go back to the two Mrs. Ministers. The interpreter has mediated actively without infringing her deontology. She has helped her clients on the basis of her global vision of their converging interests and motivations. In this case, the mediator has proceeded without consulting the client who has hired her and whom she owes her loyalty13. Ms. Simcovich told me another experience of hers that I find even more telling: She is mediating between two groups of Argentine and foreign businessmen who cannot manage adequately to express their positions. She decides to take overtly her role as a mediator interrupting the dialogue and asking leave to intervene. The parties, who trusted her totally, accept. She then addresses each group: ‘If I understand correctly, your position is such and your objections to theirs such and such.’ Both parties approve the interpreters understanding while understanding themselves that the new verbalisation thereof is apter. Ruth goes on to explain to each party the other’s position and objections, whereby the negotiation now proceeds more efficiently and amicably, with everybody’s face saved. Let us now analyse another case: During the first planning mission to Palermo with a view to a UN conference to be held there a few weeks later, it behoved me to act as mediator between my team and our Italian hosts. My loyalty, of course, lied squarely with my own administrative kind: at not time was I an impartial mediator. At one point, our programme for the following day was being discussed: Our group were supposed to travel by helicopter to Corleone, and then proceed to Catania, and then return to Palermo by 16:00. My Chief (a stern, no-nonsense Scandinavian) said that we must leave at 9:00. Before interpreting, I asked him: ‘Do you want 13

Which is what, acting against all deontological rules and survival instinct, the main character in Javier María’s A Heart So White does when mediating between the British and Spanish Prime Ministers! What makes his active mediation totally out of place is the power that he usurps. © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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me to say that we must leave at 9:00 or do you want us actually to leave at 9:00?’ Since he trusted both me and my professional judgement, he replied ‘You say whatever you like, provided we manage to leave at 9:00.’ So I “translated” ‘We are leaving at 8:00.’ It then took a series of face negotiating moves to get the Italians to agree (it was way too early for them!), which I made more or less on my own. Needless to say, we ended up leaving at 9:00. Indeed, there are several reasons that explain a) how I realised the best way to achieve my client’s ends (which were shared with the other interlocutors: after all, they wanted to accommodate us, so that face was compatible at worst and at best convergent), b) how I assessed both (groups of) interlocutors’ face, and, perhaps most importantly, c) how I dared mediate actively, plus d) how I managed to “get away with it” to the satisfaction of all concerned. I think it is more or less evident. I can hear a choir of protestations to the effect that this was a very special case, that I was not a bona fide mediator, that I just happened to apply my professional skills to a situation where I was, too, part of one of the negotiating teams. All of this is undoubtedly true, but it corroborates the theoretical point that I am trying to make. An even more blatant example was narrated to me by a practitioner who used to work at the highest level in his government. He was accompanying his Minister of Agriculture on an official visit to another country, there was to be a reception that evening and the Minister, a man of humble peasant origins was extremely ill at ease at the fact that he was expected to make a speech of sorts. ‘What shall I say?’ he asked his interpreter. ‘Just thank them for their hospitality and say how truly important this visit is for both countries and a few other niceties’ was the reply. ‘You know what’ then said the Minister, ‘I’ll just talk and you interpret whatever you think I should be saying.’ As you can see, this colleague’s minister told him exactly what the Second Lord had told his interpreter: ‘I’ll gabble enough and good enough. As for you, interpreter, you must seem very politic.’ Old Will Shakespeare had it all right a good five centuries ago! The instructions “to be politic,” moreover, may not come from the speaker at all, but from the originator or commissioner, witness the following item from the front page of The Herald Tribune of June 14, 2002: “The failing health of [the prime minister and crown prince of Kuwait]... causes him to lose track of what is happening around him for long periods of the day... He drops the thread of conversations to such extent that the royal interpreters are periodically instructed to tell visiting statesmen anything except his inarticulate meanderings.”

Now, this shows an exceptional trust in the interpreter, and it also shows how, when in doubt, an enlightened client will let the mediator make the professional choices that serve his, the client’s, best interests14. 14

These stories, which I hold to be 100% true, tie in with what the legendary League of Nations turjuman André Kaminker is alleged to have replied to a diplomat who took him to 136

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We can see the importance of face when it comes to chose between active and passive mediation: When face is convergent, both parties (or, if we count the client, all three, and if we count also the mediator, then all four of them) are interested in the best and smoothest possible flow of communication. This, in principle, ought at least to give the “translator” a green light actively to help communication - by mediating actively, he is not being more or less loyal to any of the parties: None of them will take him to task if they perceive that the mediator’s initiative and interventions actually help communication to the benefit of all concerned. More importantly, this ought actually to prompt him to mediate actively. When face is not convergent, however, the mediator’s initiative and interventions may be perceived as -and objectively be- a ‘favour’ to one of the parties at the expense of the other. Particularly in this case, the party who actually pays the piper will normally expect all interventions to be in its behalf - it may request or even demand such interventions. Covert and overt mediation Mediation can be overt or covert. When the mediator -no matter how activeremains “invisible,” his mediation is covert. When, on the other hand, his mediation is openly such (as is most notably the case of dialogue interpretation in which the mediator actively and visibly assumes the role of “traffic cop”), it becomes overt. It can happen that only one of the parties (normally either the most sophisticated or the one to which the mediator owes his loyalty) is aware of the mediator’s active role. In such instances, the mediation would be active and overt for that party, while remaining passive and covert for the other - we can see it in the case of the royal Kuwait interpreters: for their commissioners (and anybody present who speaks both languages), they would be mediating most actively and overtly, whilst for the visiting dignitaries who did not guess what is going on (a rather unlikely case, I presume), they would be mediating as passively and covertly as theoretically befits a turjuman caught between two VIPs. It is all a matter of power What these anecdotes prove is that the crucial perquisite for a mediator’s effective active mediation is the trust of at least one of the parties, preferably both - i.e. the mediator must be socially empowered to mediate actively. True, such trust and, therefore, empowerment are sadly wanting most of the time. I task for not having interpreted him faithfully: ‘Monsieur, je n’ai pas dit ce que vous avez dit, mais ce que vous auriez du dire.’[“Sir, I didn’t say what you said, but what you should have said.”]. Se non è vero, e ben trovato, although I, personally, do very much hope that this particular anecdote is apocryphal. Of course, if it is true, then the interpreter’s hyperactive mediation would have been more than ethically questionable... whilst providing a plausible explanation of the fact that some of those legendary interpreters seemed to manage fortyminute long consecutive without notes. © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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submit that this is so because clients have no idea of the specifically mediating role that mediators can play in the interests of communication. And I further submit that they do not because mediators themselves are either not fully aware of their possible role, or not all too sure of the social recognition of their professional credentials. In any event, as we can see, the choice between the two poles is a matter of face and trust and, therefore, empowerment. Also, active mediation, as we have seen, can be overtly or covertly so. In the first case, the interpreter mediated both actively and covertly: most probably, neither lady was aware of the interpreter’s actively taking over the communicative traffic. In the Palermo and the Ministers cases the mediation would have been overtly active to his empowering interlocutors even though it would have appeared as passive to the other party. In the case of the Kuwaiti prince, instead, the mediation would have been overtly active for the originators -as well as, most probably, for his guests- whilst His Highness would have not noticed anything. Needless to add, mediation may be overtly active for both parties when the interpreter literally takes over, as in the case of the businessmen above and many other quoted in the literature. In this latter case, of course, all parties agree to empower the mediator, who has thus earned everybody’s trust and can then mediate much more effectively. As we can appreciate, García Landa, Gutt’s and most traditional concepts perfectly describe and explain prototypical cases, such as the mediation between the Argentine and European ministers as actually carried out, without any need to delve into motivations, intentions, interests and effects. But they are too strict when it comes to explain all others, most especially the last one - and for a very simple reason: the other interpreters do not translate! They don’t even bother to achieve anything remotely resembling LPIo/LPCi identity. All that traditional models can help us with is to say that, indeed, whatever the interpreters do, it is not translation. That, I submit, is far from enough - if not from the heights of translation theory, at least from inside the polluted marshes of everyday practice. Had the ministerial and princely interpreters done otherwise, they would, no doubt, have translated well, but they would have been poor mediators. This leads us to the following question: Does the mediator have the right to modify (and, especially, to improve upon) the original? For the nonce, let me stress that, as the cases above show, mediation is a wider notion than translation. The moment very often arrives when the mediator chooses not to translate, consciously renouncing any attempt at producing any kind of LPIo/LPCi identity. I shall limit myself, however, to view mediation from translation, since translation tends to be, after all, the basic game. For this it is better to keep close to the reality of human life, i.e. to orality. Largo al factotum della città! Since I have no actual proof of any of the anecdotes above, let me proceed to an example quoted by García Landa himself in his seminal thesis:

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Do:

“...Ensuite nous avons ce programme auquel vous faites partie que est le ICX International Customers Executive Program... Quelques écoles... trois facultés qui sont des facultés...”

[...Next we have this programme which you are part of which is the ICX International Customers Executive Program... Some schools... three colleges that are colleges...] Di:

“...Después tenemos este programa de aquí al que en el que ustedes participan... la equis es para e-xe-cutive... hay algunas escuelas... ”

[“Then we have this programme here in which in which you participate (the x is for e-xe-cutive), there are some schools...”]

It is more than apparent that, however justified or unjustified, convenient or inconvenient, the additional information provided by the interpreter falls completely without “translation” proper. The interpreter has mediated most actively, independently, and based exclusively on his own assessment of relevance to his client. The explanation could not be more eloquent: “En lisant ... ces deux discours textifiés, le lecteur doit tomber dans le piège, il doit penser que l’interprète a mal interprété le Do, car il a laissé tomber une partie du Do. “ICX”, a dit l’orateur ce matin-là, “veut dire International Customers Executive Program”. Or, l’interprète, à ce moment-là, s’est limité à expliquer le X dans ICX. Le X de ICX, a dit l’interprète, vient du mot anglais “e-xe-cutive”. La voix de l’interprète devient très expressive et emphatique lorsqu’elle prononce ce mot anglais. Elle ralentit la phonation au moment de “chanter” la syllabe “-xe-” de “executive”... Nous voulons démontrer que l’interprète a mal traduit mais bien interprété, car il a opéré dans la situation de l’acte de parole dans laquelle il était “immersé”... Il me semble évident que l’interprète... a décidé de ne pas “traduire” l’explication du sigle ICX, c’est-à-dire de ne pas répéter automatiquement, machinalement, l’explication qui vient de donner l’orateur... puisque cette explication se trouve, noir sur blanc et en lettres toutes grandes sur l’écran. Il a préféré utiliser les quelques secondes dont il dispose pour expliquer la présence du X dans ICX qui est peut être intrigante, voire, énigmatique pour qui ne connaît pas la façon anglo-saxonne d’épeler les mots. C’est comme si l’interprète s’était mis dans la peau de ceux qui l’écoutent et s’étaient dit : “Je viens de Madrid. J’ai vécu toute ma vie en Espagne. Je n’ai pas appris l’anglais. Je vois sur l’écran que ICX veut dire apparemment : “international customers executive” mais pourquoi n’ajoutent-ils le “p” de “program” pour former un sigle complet ICXP ? Et surtout, d’où sort ce “x” ? Le sigle devrait être ICEP. N’y a-t-il pas une erreur quelque part ? Ces étrangers son tellement étranges...” (García Landa 1978, pp. 70 and foll.) [Reading these two textified speeches, the reader must fall into the trap: He must think that the interpreter has incorrectly interpreted the Do, since he omitted a part thereof. “ICX,” the speaker had said that morning, “stands for Customers Executive Programme.” Yet at that moment, the interpreter has limited himself to explaining the X in ICX. The X in ICX, he said, comes from © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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the English word “executive.” In pronouncing this English word, the interpreter’s voice becomes very expressive and emphatic; when it ‘sings’ the syllable “-xe” in “executive” it slows down phonation. We wish to show that the interpreter has translated badly but interpreted well, since he operates in the situation of the speech act in which he is “immersed”. It seems evident to me that the interpreter decided not to “translate” the explanation of the acronym ICX, i.e. not to repeat automatically, without reflecting, the explanation just given by the speaker since such explanation can be found, black on white and in huge letters, on the screen 15. He has chosen to use the few seconds available to him to explain what X is doing in ICX, which is somewhat intriguing, even puzzling, for someone who is not familiar with the Anglo-Saxon way of spelling words. It is as if the interpreter had placed himself in his addressees’ shoes and had said to himself “I’m coming from Madrid. I have lived all my life in Spain. I don’t know English. I can see on the screen that ICX seems to mean “international customers executive,” but why don’t they add the ‘p’ of ‘programme’ so as to form a complete acronym ICXP? And, above all, where does that ‘x’ come from? The acronym ought to be ICEP. Isn’t there a mistake somewhere? These foreigners are really bizarre16.]

Indeed, the interpreter here translated “badly,” but he interpreted “badly” also. Contrario sensu, if this had been a multilingual conference and, say, the German interpreter had not provided such an explanation, would it then mean that his interpretation was incorrect? If a different Spanish interpreter in a similar situation had chosen not to provide the explanation (or, more realistically, had not even thought of providing it), does it mean he would have been interpreting worse than the one above? Not by a mile! What is it then that this practitioner did better than merely ensure LPIo/LPCi identity? He made his own speech act more relevant to his users - and he did it by deliberately eschewing, not literality, but identity of propositional meaning itself! (Let us remember that this happened in the mid seventies, when Spain, nowhere near being admitted to the EU, was but an occasional newcomer to this kind of meetings. Nowadays, this specific kind of active intervention on the part of a Spanish interpreter in the European context would be patronising, but certainly 15

It is interesting that García Landa stresses all the elements that I have explicitly incorporated into the developed model: The interpreter makes his intervention more relevant not only by adding semantic material (Fi(SnL)), but also by dint of elocution (C) and taking advantage of the redundance between the semantic content of Fo and the information displayed graphically on the screen (E). For García Landa that graphic information is simply part of the situation. To my mind, as I have explained, it is worth grouping it with the semiotic stimulus. 16

Notice that the play on words “étrangers/étranges” is altogether lost in English. Even more noteworthy is the fact that the presumed Spanish original, “extranjeros/extraños,” offers a much less obvious pun. The loss is only such in the English translation of the French translation, which, in this regard, is more effective than the original - except that not because the translator is a better writer than the original author (after all, they are both García Landa!), but because the French language serves the pun on a platter. 140

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not back then.) What this practitioner did, then, was go beyond translating or interpreting: He took it upon himself to help his audience make more sense than the speaker meant them to make; and he did so on the basis of an analysis of relevance which is seldom seen so actively pursued in practice - or in theory. This practitioner “translated” badly but mediated superbly, at least that is what I think. He mediated actively: he went beyond simply compensating for the hermeneutic cleavage between speaker and addressees. He realised that the possible puzzlement at that actually irrelevant X would increase the processing effort on the part of his addressees and, perhaps, distract them from what is really relevant. This active mediation may be more common or readily acceptable by lay users or clients -or more daringly indulged in by practitionersin oral mediation, but nowhere can it be written that it would be “bad” in translation... why should it? It always depends. As a matter of fact, what would be so bizarre or unethical about, say, a footnote by the translator explaining that befuddling X? Or the translator’s footnotes are not an overt instance of active mediation? Of course, this active mediation is artificially hidden, covert (or, rather, covertly overt), because the written page offers the possibility of graphically separating and typographically distinguishing “translation” proper from “mediation” - but that is a mirage, an optical illusion: Footnotes may be neatly isolated and discretely printed in a smaller font at the bottom of the page, but they are read in the middle of the act of reading itself, as a translator’s aside that actually interrupts the translated act of speech, that actually irrupts into the “original” - and that is why endnotes are so dramatically different: For the reader who does not want to be interrupted, they are blissfully out of the way; for the reader who actually needs or wants the mediation, they are maddeningly absent. Footnotes are (perceived as) part and parcel of the speech act as it progresses, whilst endnotes are (perceived as) a separate series of acts of speech, a series of afterthoughts that frequently compel the reader to go back and reread the relevant passage (or, worse, literally stop reading and leaf impatiently through the book in search for the mediator’s illuminating intrusion). Regardless of the specific assessment of this specific instance of mediation, it cannot be adequately described without developing the model of translation into a fully fledged model of interlingual mediation, or be assessed except on the basis of relevance.

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The model of interlingual mediation We simply have two successive speech acts in different languages: WZ > Yy > LPIKo 6 [Fo(XmL,SmH,VmR,JmQ)CmEm]GPMVHtm  UZ > LPCKo 6 Aa [6 ] ---------------------------------------------------Do----------------------------------------------[6 ] WZ > Yy > LPIKo 6 [Fo(XnL,SnH,VnR,JnQ)CnEn]GPMVHtm+n  UZ > LPCKo 6 Aa --------------------------------------------------Di-----------------------------------------------

Where the symbol [6] stands for the adaptation that the mediator, bringing his subjectivity professionally and deontologically to the fore (if not necessarily overtly, of course), operates between LPCo and LPIi - i.e. between what he has understood and what he now means to convey. Mediation succeeds when, within a given objective situation influenced by subjective emotional and cognitive factors, relevant identity [=] is established between what the speaker wishes to convey and what the mediator’s interlocutor understands: LPIo[=]LPCi

The subtype of homoscopic homofunctional mediation succeeds if: Yy > LPIo [=] LPCi 6 Aa

Which means that there is both LPIo/LPCi identity and an adequate (i.e. the best possible under the circumstances) degree of pragmatic correspondence between the original speaker’s pragmatic intentions and the contextual effects of comprehension on the mediator’s interlocutor. A mediator, however, can strive for pragmatic correspondence through non-translation: Yy > (LPIo LPCi) 6 Aa

In this specific case, there is no LPIo/LPCo identity (i.e. their propositional content is totally different), but nevertheless relevant effects are achieved. This is the model normally applicable, for instance, to the “translation” of advertisements, titles and other mainly vocative texts - as well as to the interpretation for the minister or the crown prince above. And it can pursue, of course, many other goals, even the most unidiomatic literality or maximum possible equivalence at any formal level. It all depends on the mediator’s skopos. The mediator’s assessment of his skopos, as a matter of fact, is his first professional judgement and, as such, open to professional and deontological criticism. It is, therefore, also the first thing that ought to be assessed when judging professional performance at any level: First comes an evaluation of how apt is the assessment of what counts as relevant identity under

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the circumstances. Only then does it make sense to evaluate how aptly it has been carried out in practice. In the terms of my descriptivist colleagues, the first thing to assess is the initial norm, because all subsequent tactical choices can only be assessed against it. In the last chapter, I will be analysing, among others, several translations of Pushkin’s Eugene Oneguin. Except for Nabokov, all English translators have opted for a “domesticating” approach. From a different perspective and out of a different motivation, a “resistive” translator such as Venuti might have chosen Nabokov’s or some other undomesticated path to Pushkin’s masterpiece. My model could serve to describe, explain and, eventually, assess all these and other alternative approaches and their actual implementation. This is, then, an ideal model of what may be heterofunctional/heteroscopic mediation, which posits as felicity condition relevant identity between LPIo and LPCi - which, let me stress, can equal zero LPIo/LPCi identity in García Landa’s sense. In the case of heteroscopic/heterofunctional mediation, of course, it is no longer the original skopos and functionality that govern the mediated speech act. Here, relevance is assessed as a function of the new skopos and functionality. Thus, the model serves also as a quality standard, harmonising description and prescription: Given the mediator’s skopos and his speech act’s intended functionality themselves subject to assessment and criticism- unjustified, avoidable deviations from LPIo/LPCi identity can be deemed to be methodologically wrong: they count as translation mistakes if they frustrate LPIo/LPCi identity and they count as mediation mistakes if they frustrate optimum pragmatic correlation or, if you prefer, functionality. It is thus applicable for evaluating translations, since for comparison’s purposes any pair of components can be chosen: LPIo/LPCo will show how well a translator has apprehended sense; LPCo/LPIi - how well he has understood his mediating task17; LPIi/Fi - how efficiently he has accomplished it; Fo/Fi (globally or by components) - all formal transformations (for instance, SmH/SnH will evince differences at the semantic representations level, while VmR/VnR allows to compare rhythm, metre, rhyme, etc.). In my view, it is particularly relevant for analysing the displacement of cohesion and modal markers from Fo(XmL,SmH) to Cn in simultaneous interpretation, since such suprasegmentalisation reduces the semantic density of Fi thereby contributing to a more poised, natural elocution - which, in turn, increases relevance. On the other hand, taking advantage of illustrations can increase relevance in written mediation, since any redundancy between it a Fo(XmL,SmH) and En allows in turn to write less. Thus, once assimilated by teachers and students, the model can become a valuable teaching aid; especially since at times analysis remains at 17

The transmutation of LPCo into LPIi, by the way, takes place inside the “black box” and is the subject of Setton’s excellent book (1999) on simultaneous interpretation and of Lörscher’s research into translators’ behaviour (1986, 1989, 1992a y b, and 1996), Wilss (1983, 1989 and 1996), and Kussmaul (1991, 1994 and 1995), among others, have also contributed to discuss the issue. It is also the one effort that Gile does not take into account. © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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the respective morphosyntactic and semantic structures, neglecting prosody, registry, elocution, graphic layout and kinesics (let alone all the objective and subjective social features not accessible to observation, such as WZ, K, UZ, etc.) or in view of the frequent absence of the essential question: Will the addressee understand the translation the way it is meant to be understood? Or, more laconically, LPIo[=]LPCi? The competing claims on the mediator’s loyalty Loyalty is the compass that allows a mediator to chart his strategic course. Specifically, loyalty will help him establish what counts as relevant LPIo/LPCi under the specific circumstances. Basically, a mediator’s loyalty, like that of any other professional, is owed first and foremost to his profession. Professional deontology governs all ethical and technical options down the line. Within this supreme loyalty, and again like with any other profession, a mediator’s loyalty is owed to whoever hires his services. A mediator may be recruited by the speaker/author, his interlocutor(s)/reader(s) or a third party. The latter is normally the case. There is, however, a difference between paying the piper and calling the tune. The mediator’s loyalty to the profession -and through it, to society at large- poses its own, I submit, supreme imperative to uphold, foster and develop ever more scientific professional norms. As a part of his loyalty to society at large, for instance, I think that a mediator should be at the forefront of good language use - although never at the expense of intelligibility. As an expert linguist, he has a mission to uphold, foster and help develop his language. Mediators are at their language’s borders and should play a decisive role in regulating -insofar as possible- incoming traffic. Spanish -as well as, I presume, most other net importers of translation- is rife with moronic calques and illderived or parasitic neologisms. I am not asserting at all that mediators should be a conservative force, but rather that, next to the great masters, and on a par with other professionals influencing use and taste (journalists, non- literary writers, politicians, celebrities and, generally speaking, public personalities) they should help manage change and evolution. In this respect, mediators should be neither behind their users nor so far ahead of them as to become irrelevant. They should, I submit, remain with their users, but leading the way. Ideally, a mediator should be an expert linguist in the broadest sense of the word: an authority on his languages, an expert grammarian and a consummate communicator - in short, a true professional. We are still far from it, but this is the only right, progressive way. And there is something else: Functionalist approaches have rightly been taken to task for implicitly accepting an a-ethical “everything goes18.” Yes, a professional mediator, as any other professional, owes his loyalty to the client -once he has accepted him as such, that is- and 18

Most notably by Newmark (1982, 1983a and b, 1984, 1988, 1991, 1993, and 1998), but also by, among others, Gentzler (2001). 144

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accepting a commission is both a deontological and generally ethical act. Loyalty, however, is not to be confused with obedience or submission - let alone obsequiousness. As any other human being, a mediator should be more than a mercenary fighting other people’s wars. There is, always, a non mediationspecific higher moral instance, which almost alone among translation scholars, Peter Newmark has always upheld explicitly. This, of course, escapes our subject, and that is, I am sure, why other authors have not dwelt upon it. But I think it ought to be remembered: professional deontology reigns supreme as the profession-specific manifestation of ethics. No other claim ought to supersede a mediator’s loyalty to the profession, itself subject to his overall ethical posture as a human being19. The emotive interest: the cognitive engine’s fuel Non-vegetative human actions have cognition as their engine, except that this engine cannot work without emotive fuel. The great difference between the way an intended interlocutor understands and the way a mediator does lies in that he who pays attention because he wishes to is emotively much more predisposed to understand than anybody who does so because he has to. In this respect, a mediator is, first, an contra natura interlocutor and then a contra natura speaker: he must strive to understand (critically, to boot) utterances that he does not give a hoot about, from people he does not care about or whom he even dislikes, in order then to say or write things that do not interest him for interlocutors he does not care about or whom he even dislikes. This may be the foremost difficulty in remote interpreting. At both UN experiments, the unanimous complaint was not so much that the room was empty, but about the emptiness surrounding it - the impossibility of interacting with delegates, of consulting them, of finding oneself totally isolated from the people. That is why it is crucial to teach mediators to become interested as truly as possible in the interlocutors between whom they are called upon to mediate, and in their metacommunicative purposes. In order to perform in an optimally effective (and less stressful) way, a mediator must understand as a concerned interlocutor and then speak as a concerned speaker. If an actor cannot be a murderer both ambitious and weak for two hours, he cannot be a good Macbeth. And it is not enough to have killed in a moment of irrationality: killing does not necessarily equals murder, nor is it required to have killed in order to be a murderer “inside.” And, as Macbeth himself, he will not be listening to a colleague reading lines but to Lady Macbeth. One has to become the character. A mediator must be, insofar as possible, all the “characters” he is called upon to “play” both as a speaker and as an interlocutor20. Of course, it is often more than difficult, 19

See Chesterman (2001), Nord (2001), Gouanvic (2001), and Bulut and Kurultay (2001).

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The only one to have seen it and said it in so many words is Bertone (1989), who rightly brings in none other than Stanislavski. © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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but one must still try. Less metaphorically, a mediator must understand as if he was really interested both in what he understands and says and in the people he listens or speaks to. It is no coincidence that one of his most useful attributes is and insatiable curiosity - 100% emotive that it is: That is the fuel that will lead him to wish to understand and, if he is lucky, to enjoy understanding. Only then will he be able to speak or write naturally. A professional mediator must get used to tame his U and W with a view duly to manage the transition from LPCo to LPIi - from what he has understood to what he is now about to make understood. The model has the great advantage of showing this graphically at the very centre of the whole process, and it also shows the importance of the unconscious Z that moves the mediator to understand and to speak: A mediator who is not constantly prone to mutual orientedness is like a tone-deaf instrumentalist; and this, of course, comes from nature, not from nurture.

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CHAPTER III QUALITY: THE CRUCIAL ISSUE DESCRIPTIVE STUDIES CANNOT BEGIN TO APPROACH “No translation without (implicit or explicit but clear) justification or explanation of the theory applied! “ J. Vermeer (in Reiss & Vermeer 19961:9; my (trans)translation) “... There is a mode of implicit theorisation within translational practice, since the generation of alternative [translations] depends on a series of at least intuitively applied hypotheses. Even though this theorisation usually never becomes explicit, the ability to develop and manipulate hypothetical [translations] is an essential part of translational competence. Unsung theory -a set of premises resulting from theorisationmay... be seen as the constant shadow of what translators do every day; it is what improves as student translators advance in their specific craft; it is the mostly unappreciated form of the confidence slowly accrued through the making of countless practical decisions; it is what most competent translators know without knowing that they know it.” A. Pym (1992a:1756)

The limitations of antiseptic descriptivism In Viaggio 1988a I had taken issue with the following assertion by Toury: “For me, theory formation within Translation Studies has never been an end in itself. Its object has always been to lay a sound basis and supply an elaborate frame of reference for controllable studies in actual behaviour and its results and the ultimate test of theory is its capacity to do that service” (1988:10)

My contention was that, since for me, the ultimate object of theory is its capacity to account for all relevant phenomena, Translation Studies cannot stop at observing, registering and describing actual translational behaviour and eliciting from it what often turns out to be mostly intuitive, semiconscious or acritical - even reactionary, unscientific norms (valuable as the endeavour is)1. Rather, it must strive to differentiate within that mess of a mass methodologically competent behaviour, the kind of behaviour that impels actual progress by fostering scientifically progressive norms - in modern industry they 1

May I recommend Shäffner (1998) for a most interesting discussion, as well as Mayoral Asensio (2001). © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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call it “best practices.” This Translation Studies can only hope to achieve by becoming what so many English-writing scholars dread: Translatology, a discipline based on its own domain-specific theory - which is the purpose of this book. I submitted that Translation Theory has three tasks: a) to define the constitutive rule of translation - what translation is, always, as opposed to any other communicational phenomena, in order in that light b) to explain why it is that translations can be and indeed are different - that they can follow different norms and still qualify as translations; and c) to help assess different methods, products and norms as more or less apt or efficient as a function of the task in hand. In other words, like other theories, translation theory must define the essence of its object of study (i.e. its constitutive rule), and only then proceed to explain and describe its actual existence (i.e. how this rule applies in each specific case), making apparent, as a consequence, ways for the development and improvement of both processes and products (whence its decisive pedagogical importance). Needless to say, I added, as any social object translation will have fuzzy edges, imperceptibly “degenerating” into nontranslation. This too is to be accounted for by its theory. The reason we are still debating such basic epistemological questions is due, I suggested, to the extremely recent social recognition of translation as an economically significant activity, inextricably and dialectically linked to the development of the productive forces of society. This recognition has been both the consequence and the cause of a dramatic increase in the need for down-toearth, nonce pragmatic translations, which has entailed the need to train translators and interpreters efficiently and in great numbers - whence, in turn, the tremendous development of academic research and scientifically-based theoretical thinking. Nowadays, observing and describing translational behaviour in a theoretical vacuum makes as much sense as the sociohistorical observation and description of medical behaviour. If what interests us is not the history but the development of therapeutic potential of medicine, it is not enough behaviourally to describe how physicians go or have gone about treating specific patients or diseases: we must ask whether, given the knowledge and resources available at a given time and place, a specific instance of medical behaviour is/was competent, to what extent and why. Pasteur’s intuitions were only that until proved right - until then, he could not claim more scientificity than Clemenceau and those who denied the existence of microbes as pure speculation - but he knew better than his contemporaries, not just differently. Toury rightly points out that the weakness of descriptive translation studies is that it has focussed almost exclusively on literary translation and norms: As literature itself, literary translation is remiss to objective assessment if not with respect to obvious translation “mistakes,” then vis-à-vis translational methodology. Translation Studies will always remain intuitive and impressionistic if confined to the elusive realm of art. On the other hand, if the evolution of non-literary translation norms were addressed, I am certain that it 148

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would evince a remarkable parallelism to economic development, with the communicatively aptest norms gaining the upper hand in the most industrially advanced and educationally developed societies. Now that pragmatic translation is by far the main field of translational activity2, the one schools train students and business and international organisations hire mediators for, the question is legitimately posed whether the strictly sociohistorical study of norms actually helps to a) understand translation better, b) translate better and, c) teach to translate better. Is the sociohistorical study of what astronomers have thought about the heavens above relevant to our present understanding of the universe? Is Ptolemy scientifically relevant today? Is, then, St. Jerome? Or are there objective, knowable laws, principles and facts, cultural, social and generally communicational that allow us to understand how different approaches actually work, regardless of the historically and culturally conditioned subjective intuitions of individual practitioners in different places at different times? Only such hindsight can, on the other hand, help us with an objective historical assessment of the development of translational thinking on the basis of the data and experience objectively available to different thinkers at different times and places. If such objective criteria -or, if you prefer, knowledgeable intersubjective agreement on the assessment of empirical facts- are impossible, then everything goes and there is nothing left for us to teach, or learn, or simply do better. Except that, fortunately, there is: We can safely teach, for instance, that, whilst the aptness of the semantic vs. communicative norms may remain moot in the exalted, largely subjective heights of literature, when it comes to efficient pragmatic communication, an unabashedly communicative translation -one that is clearer, shorter, more elegant, more user-friendly than its original- is not simply a token of a different norm: it is a token of a better norm. The preceding chapter, I suggest, has inexorably proven this. Also, more modern -i.e. more scientific- approaches to pragmatic translation have not developed in response to new concepts of translation nurtured in the mind of originators, but are the consequence of a better grasp of the phenomenon by translators themselves: Improvements in translation quality are due to the fact that translators have got better, and they have gotten better not because they have improved their linguistic or thematic knowledge, but because they have developed their concept of what a good translation is, which is the practical way of looking at what translation is - quality is always relative to a theory. This ever more widely shared view among practitioners and thinkers, then, is not the result of a new “cultural” norm come from without our discipline, but of our own deeper collective awareness of what translation is, is supposed to be and function as: an effective form of mediated interlingual communication. As we tread upon the third millennium, translational norms are finally ceasing to be simply a 2

Nowadays, with publishing turned into a big transnational business, many kinds of erstwhile literary translating can be considered pedestrianly pragmatic. © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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culturally-bound -or even purely personal- concept, becoming based on an ever deeper knowledge of the objective laws governing communication through speech. The big difference between our present-day discussion and the debates before the explosion of scientific knowledge about human communication is akin to the difference between the arguments of ancient philosophers and modern-day scientists on, say, the nature of matter. Leucippus and Democritus could only guess that the universe is made up of minuscule particles - we know better: we know it for a fact. When it comes to translation as a form of mediated interlingual communication (an essence that had escaped every single translator and scholar until fairly recently), we do or at least should indeed know better and make no metaphysical apologies for our “belief.” Sheer descriptive studies cannot tell us anything about the quality of any particular approach to or instance of mediation. As a case in point, “watching” what interpreters or translators actually do or have done, though indeed a necessary starting point, is far from enough to extract useful generalisations: Since not all mediators do the same, i.e. since not all of them evince the same conceptual approach or heuristic ability, the task remains to establish, insofar as possible, objective criteria to rate their respective concepts and performance, initially vis-à-vis the task in hand and then -again if at all possible- in more general or absolute terms. The reasons ought to be obvious: for starters we would wish to foster good practices and discourage bad ones. Specifically, we would wish to teach would-be mediators the best practices available, so that they will be able, in turn, to be better than their elders and, eventually, worse than their own professional offspring. But then, we would also wish to see how even the best practices themselves might be improved. So the basic question to be posed, the one that recalcitrant descriptivists refuse to ask, let alone answer, is what allows us, not only individually, but collectively, to tell a bad mediator or specific instance of mediation from a good one from a better one from the very best so far. This in turn leads to ask about the criteria that teachers apply to rate, pass or fail students, and, most importantly, how uniform, coherent and valid they are. The issue of quality in interlingual mediation has several aspects: 1) Linguistic hermeneutic and heuristic ability in the relevant languages. 2) Extralinguistic hermeneutic and heuristic ability - the ability relevantly to understand and produce different types of discourse. 3) Sociotextual ability - the ability to produce apt texts or utterances according to different situational parameters. 4) Specifically mediational ability - the ability to identify, assess and, if possible and advisable, help palliate or overcome all manner of mismatches hermeneutic, psychological, cultural, etc.- between interlocutors on the basis of an apt assessment of the metacommunicative framework3. The first two components are specifically “translational,” whilst the last two are more 3

Which is, precisely, what is missing in House’s (1977) apparently exhaustive model.

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generally mediational. An interlingual mediator will be better the greater each of these abilities. As we know, alas, they can vary widely not only from one mediator to the next, but, more problematically, their mix also varies, and, still more problematically, not all mediators excel equally at all of them. Each of these abilities, moreover, can be decomposed into several sub-abilities. At the linguistic level alone, and with respect to each active language, a mediator may be better or worse at producing certain kinds discourse - and then at the different levels F, C and E, and, within F, at the different levels S, H, V and R (nowhere is the distinct weight of such abilities more evident than in the translation of lyric poetry). Which give and take is better? As always in life, it depends - it depends on the specific situation and the metacommunicative purposes of the specific act of mediation. A heir to skopostheorie, the theory I am advancing is, also, a theory of quality, insofar as it does not limit itself to describing interlingual mediation, but as it describes, at the same time, good interlingual mediation. Interlingual mediation consists, always, in establishing relevant identity between meaning as originally meant and as finally understood (if it fails to do so, it has simply failed). Let us remember, however, that relevant identity can vary from barely sufficient to optimum. In this respect, quality in interlingual mediation is synonymous with relevance - except that, since relevance is always a) metacommunicative and b) ad hoc, it must be established each time. Not only that, it must be established, as it were, for each individual participant in the speech act (speaker/writer, interlocutor and other stakeholders) in order to decide on an average. There is a decisive corollary: a mediator who forces his interlocutors into working more than they ought to or produces less than adequate contextual effects is not providing optimum quality, even if he has not made a single translation error or omitted a single word or concept. Quality is thus defined positively, not anymore as the absence of mistakes or unjustified omissions or additions, but as the production of as close to an optimally relevant utterance or text as possible within the specific social situation - including, most particularly, the purpose of the mediated event, the parties’ interests and their compatibility. It is true that some aspects will remain moot or subject to disagreement. This should come neither as a surprise nor as a deterrent: Nobody would deny that there are musicological, musical and technical criteria to tell good pianists from bad ones, yet no two critics would agree on the best performance of the Appassionata. We ought to be more than contented if we could approach that kind of uncertainty. True, the very essence of great art may remain elusive, and only in the case of literary translators and, for different reasons, of simultaneous interpreters, does a comparison with classical pianists make full sense (literary translators are, after all artists, and simultaneous interpreters are, in the end, performers). Still, I find the parallel with pianists telling in several relevant

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aspects: they must evince, on the one hand, musical talent (that which no conservatory can bestow - musicians are, after all born); on the other, technical ability, sensitivity to their specific instrument, public and, generally, conditions of performance (i.e. all that which only practical practice, intuition, and, doubtless, training can give); but, and this is decisive, they must acquire and constantly update their relevant musicological knowledge (which only theoretical study makes possible, since musicians, after all, are made and must be constantly retrained). If we can assert that solitary practice, by dint of language knowledge, talent, perseverance, intuition and common sense, may be sufficient to translate or interpret, as it were, “by ear,” sensitivity towards an audience and situational parameters demand a conceptualisation that practice alone cannot produce. When the time comes really to mediate, to contribute actively to communication rather than merely limiting oneself to reproduce direct intended senses without minding the social consequences of “non intervention,” a mediator cannot do without a solid scientific theory constantly updated on a par with communication theory. We could start, perhaps, by identifying and finding ways of assessing the equivalent of these less elusive qualities in mediators and instances of mediation. Translation mistakes could be thought of as “wrong notes” - a basic quality criteria, indeed, but a relative one nonetheless: many a great pianist has played many a wrong note and still qualified as great. Why not mediators? When are translation mistakes decisive, unforgivable? In other words, perfection being, by definition, unattainable, what is the threshold of tolerance, both in qualitative and quantitative terms, in general and specifically? And, less tractably, who is to decide? Again, what is the threshold in musical performance, and who decides there? If it can be established elsewhere, there is no reason why it should not be possible with mediation. As a matter of fact, I submit that it is perhaps more decisive in the case of mediation. There cannot be, I guess, social liability for misinterpretations of the Hammerklavier (or, alas, bad translations of Shakespeare!), but mistranslations in pragmatic texts can cost millions of dollars and cause bodily harm - whilst bad oral mediation, if not necessarily produce a war, can also damage international relations and, definitely, may mean life or death to a foreigner seeking political asylum or accused of murder. I submit that users or clients or originators or commissioners are not necessarily the aptest judges of mediation quality (see also Kalina (2002). As with most professional endeavours, peer judgement, whatever its inherent limitations, must come first. Aye, there’s the rub! For who names peers? Most translations the world over -most acts of interlingual mediation, for that matter- are performed by non-professionals, and even professionals are not always up to par. This vast hordes are the ones smearing the market grey. At least within the UN, this invective also hits a sadly numerous minority of internationally recognised professionals. I know perfectly well whereof I speak and fully assume the responsibility: For nearly fourteen years my job was to 152

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assess the performance and general ability of literally hundreds of internationally recognised professional conference interpreters. The question is next posed, of course, who named me? The “administrative” diploma bestowed by an administration that does no understand a hoot about mediation nor is supposed to means strictly nothing. I might well be a consummate administrator incapable of producing or detecting a good or, therefore, bad interpretation. The question is not an administrative one. Who gives me the professional, deontological right to pass judgement on quality? I do not think it makes much sense sliding down this slippery slope. The profession is barely professionalising itself and it cannot even agree on the name of the discipline governing it. Let us first agree among ourselves those of us who, without anybody having officially conferred upon us the right to reflect, do, and are concerned with finding out what the quality of our activity consists in. The chasm between professional and expectancy norms The role of those of us who teach is to transmute natural talent into professional ability, i.e. into quality professional practice; as evaluators and examinators it is to assess our students’ performance against our own quality standards: Good or bad, keen or frivolous, we decide what counts as quality (again, even if the question can be posed, who named us?). We are thus contributing to setting professional norms - the norms against which we, professional mediators, judge our own, our colleagues’ and our students’ performance. More often than not these professional norms are at loggerheads with expectancy norms - the norms against which the layman assesses us4. The difference between translation or interpretation and better established professions is that in the latter case expectancy norms have become based on professional norms, so that, for instance, no patient will question the surgeon’s “right” to amputate (or, for that matter, the plumbers right to cut off the water), provided it is the best alternative under the circumstances - best for the task at hand, which is doing what is best for the patient. Why, then, would anybody (and much less the translator/interpreter himself) deny the mediator the “right” to “tamper with” 4

Chesterman refers to norms as the kinds of behavioural regularities that “are accepted (in a given community) as being models or standards of desired behaviour” (Chesterman 1993:4, see also 1997). He distinguishes two broad pairs of norms: On the one hand, there are production norms - having to do with methods and processes, and product norms - having to do with the form and end-results of processes. On the other, users of interpretation and translation have certain expectations about the product of our work - they have expectancy norms. We, mediators have certain principles that guide the way we arrive at such a product and set the quality standards for it - we have professional norms, a synthesis of our own production and product norms. Every profession is governed by professional norms. For an application of the concept of norms to interpretation see Shlesinger (1994) and Garzone (2002). © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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or, more palatably, “manipulate”- the original, provided it is best for those two or more specific interlocutors who are trying to communicate effectively? Again, the reason for this is sociohistorical: Physicians, architects, engineers, lawyers and other professionals have scientifically, practically and therefore socially established themselves as experts in their field; and in so doing have earned the trust of users of their services, who, at worst, are willing to give them the benefit of the doubt. This they have managed through centuries of actually striving to grasp more and more thoroughly the laws objectively governing relevant phenomena, and ever more effectively putting them to practical use. As a consequence, their scientific competence (i.e. theoretical, declarative knowledge) informs their professional performance (i.e. their practical, procedural knowledge) thereby ensuring its validity at each specific moment in the development of society. The most obvious social consequence of this is that their diplomas are recognised and protected, and that, through their professional organisations, they have the right to regulate both access to the profession and professional practice5. In other words, recognised professionals are socially empowered as such. I have already shown, I hope, how such empowerment, based on the clients’ trust in a mediator’s professional knowledge and ability, is what ultimately allows him to exercise his specialised knowledge and ability with utmost (deontologically responsible) freedom. This trust, in other words, is what allows the mediator’s professional norms to become the expectancy norms of users of their services - exactly the way it already happens in the case of physicians, lawyers, architects and whatnot. (These professionals, by the way, have not earned their social empowerment by meekly or indifferently washing their hands of the social consequences of their professional performance!) In the case of mediators, however, the problem is not simply one of social empowerment or of the esteem in which they are held by their lay users: Mediators have not yet collectively succeeded in theorising their praxis, and have yet to establish themselves and the profession to a similar extent. This is the real reason why they feel much more at the mercy of their users than other professionals. It is an objective vulnerability: Although they do normally have the linguistic and thematic competence necessary for effecting most meaning (i.e. basically semantic) transfers adequately, practitioners generally lack the declarative competence to ensure the communicative validity of their performance, i.e. to accomplish the metacommunicative task of ensuring communication no only through language but -as it happens so often- in spite of it - especially in view of the inevitable asymmetry in interests, motivations and 5

A great relative advantage of mediators in certain jurisdictions in Argentina and other countries is, precisely, that the academic diploma of Public or Sworn Translator is protected. It must be pointed out, nevertheless, that what is actually protected is a specialised aspect of the profession, not its communicative essence, which is, precisely, the specific one, regardless of whether medaiton is legal or technical or other. 154

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acceptability criteria between every speaker and his indirect interlocutors. It is here, at the metacommunicative level -his highest instance- that the mediator’s “right” to improve or otherwise “tamper with” the original is posed. Yet, we unhappy few, know that making the linguistic, terminological, stylistic, rhetorical, cultural and other adjustments in the second speech act that completes the communication circuit between the speaker and the mediator’s audience is neither a “right” nor a “duty” but an unavoidable necessity, since relevant identity between sense as intended by the speaker’s and sense as comprehended by the interlocutor is impossible without at least some degree of adaptation at all levels. The question, then, is not whether but to what extent and in what circumstances the mediator may or must legitimately improve or fail to improve, adapt or fail to adapt his verbalisation of sense, i.e. without overstepping the deontological boundaries of loyalty6. Refraining from reproducing the speaker’s foreign accent or defective diction, as correcting his grammatical and other mistakes is, after all, improving upon the original (loyalty toward the speaker is intuitively made to prevail over faithfulness to the incompetent or the stammerer). But so is to prune redundancies or altogether to suppress any information that is irrelevant or the verbalisation of which would conspire against pragmatic success. To what extent, then, does it become illicit to “manipulate” and when? Again, the answer cannot but be based on the best knowledge available about the social and physical rules objectively governing communication. Thus, the kind of a) declarative knowledge necessary to understand what kinds of adaptations are necessary in the second speech act, and b) procedural knowledge to come up with the best -i.e. most relevant- possible communicative product under the circumstances, goes far beyond the purely linguistic and thematic competence that all too many practitioners and teachers assume to be sufficient. Without such declarative buttress, even the best intuitions fail to assert themselves procedurally, whereby professional norms remain naive rather than based on the most recent scientific insights on the essence of the phenomenon in hand - which, let me repeat, is not semantic transfer but mediated interlingual communication. That, and not the layman’s intuition, whim or bureaucratic imposition, must be the sound and constantly evolving foundation of our professional norms - no more, no less! The main difference between scientific and naive professional norms revolves, then, around the practitioner’s role, responsibility, freedom and loyalty as an interlingual mediator. As such, he is there to help communication actively, not to stand by indifferently or, worse, in the way: His deontological responsibility towards both (sets of) interlocutors and whomever has hired him, as well as to the profession at large, goes far beyond aptly decoding semantic representations in one language and faithfully encoding them in another. Loyalty 6

See Nord (1991a) for translation, and, for interpretation, Viezzi (1996, and 2003a and b). © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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to the participants or stakeholders in a speech act is, therefore, a higher instance than faithfulness to any oral or written utterance. Even at the sheer level of an utterance’s meaning, what totally or partially escapes intuitive practitioners is that sense does not depend on the speaker alone, that it is equally constructed by each interlocutor through an active inferential processed governed by relevance (as developed to encompass the non-cognitive effects of comprehension), that an utterance is but an extended explicature that becomes meaningful only once the interlocutor has been able to infer the relevant implicatures. Thus, from the strictly communicative standpoint, the mediator’s communicative loyalty is both to the speaker and to the addressee(s), although in different circumstances it may shift more towards either; in fact, “faithfulness to the original” is but the most obvious form, not of equal, but of indifferent loyalty to both interlocutors although the only one intuitively perceived and accepted by the lay user and the communicatively naive translator or interpreter (and even then, only with respect to the speaker). It can be asserted, indeed, that the mediator is not responsible for the speaker’s intended sense, or for the original utterance’s semantic or pragmatic adequateness -i.e. for the speaker’s ability or willingness to make himself understood- nor for the addressee’s willingness or ability to understand - but this is not always the case. Indeed, in certain situations a good mediator is normally able to help both protagonists, so that the speaker can tailor his verbalisation more and more accurately to the interlocutor’s linguistic and cultural competence and sensitivity, and the interlocutor can hone his sensitivity to the speaker’s. This a good practitioner can achieve in two complementary ways: By making both interlocutors (or, at least, the more sophisticated one) aware of any mismatches in culture, knowledge or expectations as well as of the possible remedies, and/or by himself effecting the necessary adaptations in his own speech act. What prevents many a practitioner from understanding that, unless there are political, legal, deontological or other valid reasons not to, he must do his best to help both (groups of) interlocutors actively (although not necessarily overtly) is, thus, a misconception of translation and interpretation as a sheer exercise in interlingual transfer, whereby loyalty to the interlocutors is mistakenly equated with faithfulness to the original’s form, whether at the semantic, syntactic or lexical levels. In earlier times (and in some quarters, unfortunately, to this day) the mediator, unaware of the deeper metacommunicative nature of his role, unsure of his own linguistic and social competence, saw the speaker or the client as his despot; nowadays, a professionally competent mediator should fear nothing aside from being unable to do a linguistically and culturally competent job - or incapable of explaining and defending scientifically any contested choice. In some instances, to be sure, the mediator must be unconditionally loyal to one of the participants, and this loyalty may well entail maximum faithfulness to formal features, including semantic form. But even in such cases, his professional 156

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expertise should not be questioned or superseded. In the end, it is a matter of bringing expectancy norms up to professional norms rather than have the latter subserviently accommodate the former7. This is a long, uphill battle of selfassertion, for professional, social and personal dignity - and, by short extension, for proper remuneration. The first normative statements It is most illuminating to take a look at the first deontological statements by the pioneer employers of interpreters: the League of Nations and the International Labour Office. Baigorri offers a wealth of well-documented evidence to the effect that, prior to the introduction of SI, interpreters were instructed (N.B. instructed, not allowed) to abridge the original speeches. Moreover, ILO specifically linked the right of delegates to speak a non-official language to the obligation to submit “and abridged translation of their speech into one of the official languages, by an interpreter working for their delegation” (Baigorri 2000:78-79). Pearl would probably exult at the following paragraph quoted by Baigorri (op. cit.:140): “La interpretación de cada discurso debe ser lo más exacta posible. Los intérpretes deben tener presente que el texto de su interpretación será publicado en el “Acta Provisional” con el menor número posible de modificaciones de edición; las declaraciones oficiales... deben traducirse completas” (ibid.:140) [The interpretation of each speech must be as exact as possible. Interpreters must bear in mind that the text of their interpretation will be published in the “Provisional Record” with the least possible number of modifications by the editor; official declarations... must be translated in full.]

but would probably wince at the one following it: “Los discursos deben resumirse en cierta medida, prescindiendo de las repeticiones, y extrayendo los distintos elementos de manera más concisa que en el texto original.” [Speeches must (my italics) be somewhat abridged, doing away with repetitions and extracting the different elements in a more concise way than in the original.]

So exact is not to be confused with full! Exact means... relevantly complete - except in the case of SI: “En el estrado, el intérprete (consecutivo) deberá mirar al auditorio y hablar en forma clara... Para la interpretación telefónica (sic) los intérpretes deben seguir 7

In this respect, I fully subscribe Simeoni’s (1998) observations on habitus. © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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lo más fielmente posible la forma del discurso, tratando al mismo tiempo de hacer frases completas que se puedan utilizar para el AActa provisional” (ibid.) [In the podium the (consecutive) interpreter must look at the audience and speak clearly... When speeches are interpreted telephonically (sic)... interpreters must follow as faithfully as possible the form of the speech, trying at the same time to utter complete phrases that can be used for the >Provisional Record.’]

How can this contradictory approach be explained? Are speeches that are interpreted consecutively less important than those interpreted simultaneously? Or is completeness and faithfulness less decisive in CI? But then, how can delegates accept one or the other indifferently, simply as a function of the interpretation mode? Surely their motivations, intentions or interest in the proceedings are not mode-of-interpretation dependent! Yet it would seem so. But wait: Simultaneous interpreters worked mostly out of the consecutive interpretation into one of the languages, which was already abridged! So what really happens is that, since CI prevented but SI allowed for “completeness” of content and “faithfulness” to form, expectancy norms were consequently adapted. Also, notice that completeness and faithfulness were not meant for the benefit of delegates listening to the interpreters, but for the “Provisional Record,” and mostly in order to save editing time. Some difference in skopos and intended addressees! Indeed, at the UN there are verbatim records... of the Plenary and the First Committee of the General Assembly, and of the official meetings of the Security Council (i.e. a tiny fraction of all UN meetings). Interpreters servicing those meetings are engaged in an act of speech doubly addressed: to their direct clients (who normally do not care much about what is irrelevant) and to the verbatim reporters, whose job it is to write down every minute triviality. It is the latter’s U that governs the interpreters’ strategy! So much so that many responsible practitioners interpret, as it were, twice: first for their clients, and later on, they walk into the respective verbatim section, speech in hand, and fill their lacunae, correct their mistakes or simply hone their verbalisation for the benefit of their colleagues. Be that as it may, who can invoke any kind of universal law to the effect that an interpretation, whether simultaneous or consecutive, whether conference or not, must be complete and faithful no matter what? The only way to come up with reasonable professional norms (and, Deo volente, extrapolate them as reasonable expectancy norms) is to take stock of the totality of the speech act and its larger social context. The only objective law is that of relevant identity, which is to be applied specifically in each case. That this law has never made it into any description or prescription is due, I submit, to the fact that it is still far from being a) known, b) understood, c) assimilated and d) imposed by practitioners themselves, as physicians impose their professional norms upon their patients.

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Quality in interlingual mediation Strictly speaking, in order for communication to be noetically successful all that is required is LPI=LPC. But success at noetic communication and communicative efficiency and quality are different concepts: Good communication is optimally relevant communication - one that achieves the best results with minimum effort. Since communication is established between different (groups of) subjects who may or may not be equally able and/or willing to make themselves understood or to understand, and who may have more or less diverging skopoi, efficiency and quality are relative to each of the participants in a specific situation. This is an essential fact: as I have stressed, both speaking/writing and listening/reading are purposeful activities every bit as much as mediation. They too are to be seen from the perspective of action theory. This fact has hitherto eluded most models of translation: speaking, interpreting and listening are governed by the same principles of speech production and comprehension, communication and action. Their success and degree of quality, therefore, must be basically measurable on the same terms. Whether mediated or not, interlingual or monolingual, then, good communication starts by being successful communication - there cannot be any more basic criterion; but the fact that an act of mediated communication has succeeded at the basic noetic level is not enough for us to say that the interpreter or translator has been a good mediator. First, we must recall that the responsibility for communicative success may fall unevenly on either participant. From this perspective, a good “understander” is someone who will manage to understand most people (and not only “what they are saying”) in most circumstances, regardless of the speaker’s linguistic or pragmatic ability. On the other hand, a good communicator is someone who will succeed at communicating with most people under most circumstances - someone who has a special ability to get the message across, whatever the ability or predisposition of his interlocutors. Vermeer (1998:58) points out that a good translator, strives for optimal “text-design” according to the intended skopos and recipients: it is not enough to be just “understandable.” By the same token, we can add, a good mediator (synonymous with a good communicator) is someone who will always perceive the speaker’s communicative and other intentions no matter how inept the “text-design” is: it is not enough just “to understand.” As a mediator, therefore, the translator/interpreter must be first and foremost an expert understander of speech acts, i.e. of motives, intentions and utterances. It is precisely for this purpose that he needs passive linguistic, cultural and encyclopaedic knowledge and maturity; he must, besides, be an expert at being understood - which, besides maturity and active linguistic, cultural and encyclopaedic knowledge, requires the ability to mediate effectively. If both the speaker and the addressee are co-responsible for communication’s success and efficiency, then the mediator -as both an

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interlocutor to the speaker and a speaker to the addressee- is “doubly coresponsible”: All other things being equal, the success of communication depends more on him than on either interlocutor, since he is a specialist in mediation, i.e. at understanding other people, analysing their motives, intentions and utterances, adapting his own speech-act production, and making other people understand on the basis of their own motives, interests, and abilities, and despite their eventual resistance. Quality in mediation is thus quality in the relevant (re-)production of a series of speech perceptions through a new act of speech, and is to be sought and assessed at all relevant levels including but not limited to the “textual” level - or even the level of meaning as meant by the speaker. When it comes to comparing the speaker/author’s and the interpreter/translator=s speech acts, collating original and translated utterances makes only partial -if by no means negligiblesense. If we do not seek quality above the “textual” level, we are ignoring many questions that, from a socially relevant point of view, are often more important than what a speaker is actually saying: Why does he want to say something to begin with? What is he trying to do with what he is saying? How well is he succeeding at doing it? Why has he chosen to speak to this interlocutor, in this fashion, here and now? Only within this framework does it make sense to ask what the speaker is saying and how aptly. Empirically, of course, an interlocutor starts from the sensorial linguistic and non-linguistic stimuli and works his way “up” and “back” to the fundamental metarepresentations. As a professional interlocutor, then, a mediator has a professional duty to retrace the same steps; because he, too, must speak; and his act of speech will be clearly governed by the same factors: He too must have a motivation and an intention to say something to someone in a certain way. In this light, in order to assess the quality of a given act of interlingual mediation the following questions should be systematically posed: 1) Were the speaker’s intended meaning and the motives behind his speech act relevantly understood? 2) Was the mediations skopos well chosen both deontologically and communicatively? 3) Were the objective circumstances expertly taken advantage of or compensated for? 4) How effectively was the task accomplished? (Only the second question, that of the specifically “mediational” skopos, is specific to the translator or interpreter, but since it governs all his communicative choices, it is fundamental.) The last question, on its part, can be decomposed a) into the linguistic and non-linguistic elements of elocution, and b) into the communicative and the pragmatic choices informing meaning as (re-)produced in the new speech act. It is only here that the formal features of the mediator’s own “text” and its relationship with the original utterance -i.e. any concept of “equivalence” - become relevant. In this respect, it stands to reason that a mediator who is not adept at understanding and communicating spontaneously will hardly understand and communicate effectively in any professional situation - let alone in an interpretation booth: More than any other mediator, the simultaneous interpreter 160

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faces the tremendous challenge of understanding all that there is to understand and analysing all there is to analyse on line, in real time, in one go. Particularly when it comes to simultaneous interpreting, quality also has a strictly technical side, having to do with the ability to cope with drastic or even insurmountable limitations and obstacles, both objective and subjective: exhaustion and stress; poor physical and social working conditions (especially poor sound quality); speed, accents, lack of perspicuity; arcane subjects and vocabulary; metalingual uses; etc. As these have been more widely discussed in the literature (see, for instance, Viaggio 1996), I shall not dwell upon them here. Nor will I analyse the ever more important role of desk-top quality in written mediation (basically, the accrued functionality of Cm and Em that hitherto was not the mediator’s direct responsibility). Neither will I abound on such decisive professional attributes as efficiency -i.e. the quality/time ratio- and punctuality8. The first thing to identify: the metacommunicative framework The first thing an oral or written mediator has to understand is that the speaker does not speak or write to see whether the mediator understands, nor does the originator trust him with the job to see if he is up to it, nor does the interlocutor read or listen to see if he has said it all: Normal human beings are not translation or interpretation teachers. The first thing a mediator is to ask himself, then, is, why has someone taken the trouble to speak or write and why is someone going to take the trouble to listen to or read me? In other words, why and what for is someone spending their money on my services? What counts, then, as optimum quality performance for the social purposes that these people -speaker, client, interlocutors- are trying to achieve with my professional help? In the case of conference interpreting the more immediate materialisation of the metacommunicative setting is the conference itself, which, in Pöchhacker’s (1991 and 1995) expression, constitutes an “hypertext” of sorts. The same can be extrapolated to the setting of any other orally mediated event. Written mediation, of course, lacks such immediate setting - even in-house translators do hardly benefit from an equivalent “hypertext.” That being said, it would be a mistake not to look beyond the specific setting: the setting itself is there in order to serve further metacommunicative purposes. Teachers have a duty to instil into the younger generations a more modern, scientific, comprehensive view of mediation as more than sheer translation. Determining the metacommunicative purpose of a commission and the optimum way of carrying it out is -or, rather, ought to be- the basic component of a mediator’s skills. Fie the poor mediator who cannot or dares not do anything but “translate”! The decisive importance of the hermeneutic package Successful mediated communication depends on the mediator’s adroit application of an adequate hermeneutic package in his double role as pole of 8

See, among others, Sager (1995) and Scarpa (2001). © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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comprehension in the original speech act and pole of production in the second one. It ought to be a truism that translation in general and interpretation in particular begin with having understood and end in having succeeded to communicate. This requires, of course, an adequate innate subjective predisposition, both emotive and cognitive, that must be instilled and developed - students must be taught not only to act, but to think and feel as mediators. In this respect, then, I submit that teaching translation and interpretation must begin by teaching how communication through speech works, what its felicity conditions are, how to determine that they are in fact in place, and how to help establish them if they are not. In other words, the would-be translator or interpreter must himself understand what comprehension is, and learn how to achieve it and promote it effectively. All our collective complaints about our students lack of passive language knowledge and active language competence, and/or general culture and analytic ability can be reduced to a single hyperproblem: a precarious and flimsy hermeneutic package, full of glaring holes and dangerously loose ends, sloppily applied. It also goes without saying, on the other hand, that expertise at understanding specific people and making oneself understood by specific people in specific circumstances, despite linguistic, cultural, psychological, political and other barriers, demands intellectual and experiential maturity: One cannot really expect to come across truly competent mediators at a very young age9. That having been said, whatever the human material that may befall us, teachers, it is clear that our task can only begin to succeed if we manage to equip our students with a minimally adequate hermeneutic package -or, rather, help them acquire it on their own- and impart to them a minimally competent skill at applying it. This requires, above all, developing the habit of methodical analysis, i.e. teaching a hermeneutical method (with discourse analysis firmly rooted at its centre10). In this, our main obstacle lies in the contra natura essence of translational comprehension: A mediator, by definition, is dealing with communication not addressed to him, in which he is not directly interested, either cognitively or, worse, emotionally: a professional mediator neither listens 9

This essential maturity requirement has lead to the widespread assertion that simultaneous conference interpretation should be a postgraduate academic endeavour. I must say I cannot fathom why a simultaneous conference interpreter should be more mature than a court or a community interpreter. If anything, I would rather trust a young, inexperienced interpreter with one of my less consequential UN meetings than with the life of a seriously ill patient or a murder suspect! Maturity is a requisite of professional mediation tout court. If physicians and lawyers are not expected to mature elsewhere in academia, why then mediators? 10

There is a abundance of literature on this subject, for instance Bensoussan and Rosenhouse (1990), Bühler (1989), Gomlich (1993), Lang (1991), Lotfipour-Saedi (1990 and 1992), Mackintosh (1985), Neild (1986), Newmark (1983a), Nord (1991a and b, and 1994a, b and c) - and, most pointedly, Delisle (1980 and 1994). 162

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nor speaks “naturally.” As a matter of fact, he must learn to speak “as if” he were doing it naturally: we all know how difficult it is to get our students to understand intelligently and then to write and speak idiomatically - let alone relevantly. The main difference between a direct interlocutor (whether speaker or addressee) and a mediator lies in their respective attitude towards what is being said - and towards the person who is saying it. We must teach our students to listen and read as if they were personally interested in the pragmatic and cognitive effects of comprehension, putting themselves in the shoes if either interlocutor. Unless these basic elements are reasonably in place, there is simply no hope that in whatever real or imaginary social situation may obtain at the moment, the meaning understood by the student will be relevantly identical to the speakers meaning meant. Then comes the second part. This meaning meant that is not meant for them and about which they tend not to give a hoot our students must now transmute into their own meaning meant - except that this new LPI must next be verbalised in the target language. The turn has come for them to make themselves understood - not in general, not in the abstract, but by a specific if imaginary audience (about which they probably do not care a hoot either) endowed with its own adequate or inadequate hermeneutic package, which it will apply more or less competently or willingly, in part as a function of its own interests in or resistance to the contextual effects of having processed the stimulus provided by the mediator. At this point, our would-be mediators active competence to produce the most complete variety of suitable linguistic utterances in the target language becomes indeed decisive - but not much more than his ability aptly to assess his own audiences hermeneutic capability and willingness to cooperate, without which communication between him and them cannot succeed. Unless these complementary hermeneutic and heuristic competences are reasonably in place, there is a fat chance a) that the student will have understood the speaker, b) that he will have adequately transmuted meaning understood into meaning meant, and c) that he will then manage to convey his meaning meant relevantly, i.e. in such a way that it can be properly and effectively understood by his audience without unnecessary or unjustified processing effort; so that e) they will end up relevantly understanding the meaning meant by the speaker - which, alone, is what successful mediation is about. Pedagogical consequences Initially, all of the different abilities required for the diverse quality components must be developed, practised and evaluated separately; but in the end, mediation is a Gestalt, wherefore quality is to be ascertained globally. Fostering comprehensive mediating quality demands that a student be given -and, eventually, be expected to ascertain adeptly on his own- all factors relevant to the imaginary situation he is supposed to be mediating in. For this, the specific © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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skopos of every single exercise should be clear. In the end, quality must be assessed against well-established specific situational parameters, which include the speaker/author, his interlocutors, the mediator himself, and the latters own addressees11. In order for our teaching to be effective, we must seek to establish a pedagogically relevant typology that will allow us to explain and assess different strategic and tactical options - a typology that will allow our students a) to determine when it is necessary, advisable, mandatory, unnecessary, ill advised or disloyal to retain, add, omit, condense, abstract, change or adapt, on the basis of relevance for the specific task in hand under the specific objective and subjective circumstances, obstacles and limitations; and b) to do it expertly. This applies to all modalities of written and oral mediation, and is not a linguistic -let alone language-specific- skill. Neither is it a “technique” of simultaneous interpretation, nor can it be learnt “technically,” by merely exercising with tapes and/or speeches. Although practising in a social vacuum with isolated texts and, especially, speeches can be very useful, since it helps tackle all manner of technical difficulties, it is not what mediating is really about. It should always be made crystal-clear that there is much more to good interpretation than reflexes and linguistic ability. If the student is not trained as a mediator, if texts are never given in the context of hypertexts, i.e. if the social aspect of the profession is left to the haphazard avatars of individual practice, schools are doing their students a disservice abutting on criminal negligence. Unfortunately, even we, theoreticians and teachers, remain subliminally hostage to an obsolete all-powerful habitus that stands in the way of applying our best theoretical thinking: We forget that the translator and the interpreter are not necessarily the speakers or authors alter ego; that they mediate between the speakers lips and the addressees ears, or rather, between them as people - as subjects mutually producing speech perceptions in a specific social situation, within the general social production and exchange of goods, services and models of the world. More than mere declarative awareness, we need to have the visceral certainty that the mediator, and most glaringly the interpreter, is there to ensure effective communication, i.e. relevant identity between meaning as meant and as understood by two subjective, individual or collective, poles; that if such relevant identity is achieved, interpretation has been successful - regardless of the involuntary mistakes or awkwardness of expression, or voluntary or involuntary omissions, additions or adaptations; that any cases of literalness or semantic completeness, omissions, additions and adaptations actually add to a translations or interpretations quality if they help the interlocutors save processing effort incommensurate with the cognitive and emotive contextual effects that they would have otherwise derived, and that they detract from it if they increase the processing effort of the interlocutors without a matching 11

As suggested by Viezzi (1996), but from the standpoint of the totality of the speech act(s), to which the quality criteria he proposes (equivalence, accuracy, appropriateness and usability) are subordinate. 164

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increase in relevant contextual effects; that, therefore, the more fluid and effortless communication becomes thanks to the translator or interpreters mediating effort, the better the translation or interpretation; that, as opposed to an act of written mediation that can be reread at will and at leisure, an interpretations success or failure is always to be measured here and now, for these speakers, under these circumstances; that any interpretation that does not help achieve in real time and on line relevant perceptual identity between what is meant and what has been understood has been unsuccessful, i.e. useless - and that a useless interpretation is, by definition, bad12, whilst a translation that does not serve the purpose which it is intended to serve is also useless and, by definition, bad. Only then will we be able to set scientific professional norms for our students to measure up to, thereby forming a better generation of mediators, who will pick up the torch from us and be able to carry it ever further. The evaluators profile Who is in a better position to judge such socially and situationally conditioned communicative quality? If we wish to determine whether a cardiologist is good, whom do we ask? The surviving patients? When it comes to assessing our own professional quality, our clients are possibly just as unreliable. Like physicians, we need expert peers, but we need something in addition: In the case of oral mediation, as Lederer (1981) remarks, quality is grasped by ear. As with all kinds of oral, face-to-face communication, it is immediate intelligibility and effect that count. It is difficult to assess interpretation on its own when immediate reference to the original, coupled with repeated comparative hearings, remains possible. For this reason, I find it essential that any panel evaluating quality include expert interpreters who act as net users (i.e. who are objectively unable to understand the original or to have access to it as the interpretation is delivered), able to combine their theoretical baggage and the attentive innocence of a user. We need truly expert colleagues who, for instance, could be called upon to relay from a candidate - perhaps the keenest critics. Such a momentarily virgin expert is not the only one able to appraise an interpretation, but his unadulterated opinion (unadulterated by post mortem analysis) is indispensable in order expertly to assess prima facie quality. For this reason, his opinion ought to be elicited first, so as not to be tainted by forensic observations on faithfulness and completeness, however legitimate and justified they may be13. Exactly the same applies, mutatis mutandis, to translation and, in 12

This is the decisive difference between written and oral mediation: what counts in translation is the mediator’s -and reader’s- last effort, in interpretation it is their first: the interpreter’s worst must be good enough. 13

In order to assess the degree of difficulty of any given test, moreover, one or two jurors must have attempted it themselves, so as to be able to evaluate the student’s performances against their own. This is, of course, a difficult issue, since none of us would enjoy being outclassed by our own students... and it can happen. © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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general, written mediation: a translated text is, first and foremost, a text, and the first thing to assess is whether and to what extent it meets the requirements of textuality - with functionality uppermost among them. Only then does it make sense to analyse its validity as a translation. If it does not stand a chance to be accepted as a functional text by its reader, no matter how faithful, a translation is basically useless; and a useless translation is, by definition, bad. Ideally, divergences among evaluators should be limited to matters of high-level theorising or of taste. Until a general model of mediated interlingual communication is assimilated and agreed upon by most practitioners and, especially, teachers, however, this goal will remain elusive. In the meantime, it is essential that there be at least conceptual agreement about relevant parameters and aptness criteria. These are but ideas and suggestions aimed at helping develop, systematise and hierarchically organise different criteria against which quality can be measured at specific stages of professional expertise - from admission tests and graduation exams at interpretation schools to aptitude tests for different levels of professional practice. Perhaps the most important corollary of the fact that quality is measured against norms and of the gap between scientific professional norms and the naive norms of practitioners ignorant of developments in our discipline is that schools ought to be equally obsessive about screening out illendowed students and theoretically ignorant or backward pedagogues. Although it is essential, it is not enough to be a recognised practitioner: If quality is in the eye or ear of the evaluator, then we need extremely keen evaluators who are able to take stock of and fairly assess the relevant aspects of a student’s performance.

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PART TWO. THE MODEL APPLIED CHAPTER IV ORAL MEDIATION “Between the five-year-old child of foreign parents interpreting between his mother and the neighbourhood butcher and the fourteen simultaneous interpreters at an urgent meeting of the UN Security Council there is a continuum. Somewhere along this continuum, the profession begins. As with other professions, the socially sensible thing to do is to have it start at the relevant level. This is a function of objective and perceived social needs, and of the social recognition and scientific buttress of the profession as reflected, inter alia, in its academic status and level. As things presently stand, I see the role of established practitioners, professional associations and academic institutions as that of separating the wheat from the chaff, helping those who must know better but still cannot to improve their qualifications and skills, and weeding out those who ought to know better but refuse to or are incapable no matter how hard they try,” Epithetus, De Optima Mediatione (pseudotranslated by Giorgio Viegas).

The ontological primacy of orality As linguistics, translation theory has been both the creature and victim of textification. Moreover, as Vigotski (1934) points out, both arose out of the need to understand and subsequently translate sacred texts in dead languages. Linguistics and translation were born in awe of the dead foreign word. Later on, with the advent of modern linguistics and translation practice, as well as with the ever growing need to teach foreign languages, the object of awe became the otherwise living foreign word as embalmed in a text. The massive irruption of conference interpreting with its “unnatural” cognitive constraints in the late forties meant the sudden re-emergence of oral mediation - this time around as the most prestigious, socially visible, and well-paid mediating activity. This allowed translatological thought to go back to the forgotten roots of orality. Concomitantly, Bible translation for basically illiterate constituencies (the translation of the “living” word of God) brought the written translated word back to its humble origins as the sheer preservation of the word (once) spoken in another language. As García Landa and all the scions of conference interpreting who have reflected on translation, I am convinced that the study of speech, communication, translation and mediation must start with orality - unlike them, I do not think simultaneous or consecutive interpreting provides the most transparent window on our object.

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Be that as it may,only once the basic basics of everyday orality are clear can we safely proceed to analyse the specific constraints brought in by the written mode. I suspect that I have come up with a significant insight here: the only cognitively “unconstrained” form of translation is dialogue interpretation (DI)1. Consecutive and simultaneous interpreting (CI and SI), whether conference or otherwise, bring in hitherto irrelevant cognitive constraints, whilst written translation must deal with what may be the most constraining constraint of them all: the spatial-temporal scission of each of the two acts of speech production from the myriad acts of speech comprehension - including the one(s) by the translator himself as a reader of the original. I can hardly think of anything more unnatural than listening to someone who is not there and may have been dead for centuries, and talking to someone who is not there either and may not even have been born yet. In fact, reading and writing are so unnatural that they require specific, intense and prolonged training. We, the textified few (even if it looks like we are many), are a glaring exception within the ranks of present oral humanity, and but a tiny fraction of the human beings that have been. That the study of linguistics and translation started off at, and for a long way too long- time has clung as barnacle to, the written word has taken a heavy toll on scientific thinking. Only now are both disciplines unshackling themselves from the dead. All I can say of those translators who are, in truth, but closet philologists, is what my beloved Berlioz, the forward-looking, said of my beloved Mendelssohn, the nostalgic: ‘Il aime trop les morts.’ Mendelssohn, the consummate philologist, the rescuer of Bach, wrote sublime music (better perhaps than Berlioz’s); it was the tempestuous Frenchman, however, who helped the development of the art into a new era. The model of oral mediation It is just a matter of clarifying that both speech acts are oral: WZ > Yy > LPIKo 6 [Fo(XmL,SmH,VmR,JmQ)CmEm]GPMVHtm UZ > LPCKo 6 Aa [6] -------------------------------------------------DVo---------------------------------------------[6] WZ > Yy > LPIKi 6 [Fi(XnL,SnH,VnR,JnQ)CnEn]GPMVHtm+n  UZ > LPCKi 6 Aa -------------------------------------------------DVi----------------------------------------------

Let me start by pointing out that both in the specialised literature and in practice, there is a momentous confusion of the social and cognitive aspects of oral mediation. A bit like in old grammars that jumbled functional and semantic criteria (the noun names an object or a state, the adjective qualifies the noun), 1

I have chosen this rather un-satisfying term to cover the specific interpreting mode that is neither simultaneous nor consecutive, whatever de social setting. In this respect my use of the term does not overlap with Mason’s (1999), who refers to the social setting, whichever the mode. 168

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there exists a series of overlapping concepts that emphasise either the social or the cognitive aspect: Community interpreting, simultaneous interpreting, consecutive interpreting, conference interpreting, legal interpreting, and whatnot. From the standpoint of cognitive constraints, what counts is whether additional, “non-natural” abilities are required to produce LPIo/LPCi identity2. In that respect, interpretation can be divided into simultaneous and nonsimultaneous, and the latter between consecutive and dialogue. All three kinds can be practised in different social settings, although DI prevails at the less structured, bilingual levels, whereas CI and, especially, SI are practised mainly at international -and, in the case of SI, mostly multilingual- meetings of a technical or political nature. But SI is also practised in the courts or for the media, or for bilingual parliaments, as in Canada, whilst DI is the also name of the game in all kinds of high and low-level international encounters. Socially, the categories can multiply ad infinitum: community, escort, liaison, medical, legal, media, conference, etc. It is worth noting that sign language interpreting can also be dialogue, consecutive or simultaneous. In order relevantly to analyse the subject, I submit, it is best to approach it from the standpoint of its cognitive constraints, since these constraints objectively determine what kind of meaning identity is possible. As a case in point, short of taking it down verbatim, it is neurophysiologically impossible to reproduce any kind of long quotation in CI: if anything other than the (pragmatically apt) sheer reproduction of the relevant propositional content of an LP is required, then CI cannot ensure it unless the interpreter is provided with the text or is a consummate stenographer, in which cases interpreting becomes sight translation. Each mode thus imposes its own objective limitations, which determine what an oral mediator can and cannot do - the kind of LPIi/LPCi identity that is objectively possible. On this basis, the specific social setting establishes the kind of identity that is deemed to be typically relevant, i.e. the kind of LPIo/LPCi identity thereafter deemed sufficient. In other words, expectancy norms depend on the social situation (and ultimately cannot but adapt themselves to de facto constraints). In legal interpreting, as a case in point, maximum fidelity to form and completeness of content is normally demanded (especially when the speaker is the accused or a key witness) - independently of and above any considerations of face (especially that of the accused party). In media interpreting, in turn, relevant identity is almost exactly the opposite to what it is at a Court into the language thereof3, whilst in conference interpreting it tends to vary between both extremes. In medical interpreting, the name of the game, on the other hand, is

2

As Seleskovitch and Lederer rightly remind us, SI is not a ‘natural’ system of communication, yet it must be taught in such a way that is results in ‘natural’ discourse” (1989:107, my translation). 3

See Straniero-Sergio (1999), and Katan and Straniero-Sergio (2001), Mack (2002), Chiaro (2002), and Kurz (2002). © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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unimpeded relevant noetic understanding plus delicate face negotiating4. The model applies to each and every case, though. So what I shall attempt next is to differentiate these three kinds of modes, and briefly descant on the idiosyncrasies of the some of the typical social functions and settings. Relevance to the left, relevance at the centre and relevance to the right Indeed, for every mediator, relevance spills over both ends of the speech act. To begin with, he is to attend to the metacommunicative framework: to the speaker’s motivations and intentions (including outright reluctance), and to the predisposition or resistance to understand on the part of the interlocutor, including, needless to say, the effects that comprehension may have upon him. His most delicate analysis must start on the left of the DVo. As posited by García Landa, the interpreter must, of course, query what the speaker is saying “officially” (i.e. understand his LPIo). But it is essential as well that he constantly ask himself what the speaker is doing or, rather, trying to do by saying what he is saying, why, what for, and how well he is managing. The analysis of WZ>Yy, however, is not enough. True, in principle the interpreter is paid (or, rather, those who pay him usually believe it to be the case) to reproduce an LPIo, direct intended sense, i.e. meaning as officially meant - not to detect the reasons behind it. His basic, specific task is, indeed, to understand what the speaker is actually saying (or, rather, meaning to say), i.e. the central part of the developed model (and the beginning of García Landa’s). At that moment, Fo, and especially its semantic form, plays its crucial role as a verbalisation of the LPIo - as its only linguistic evidence (which, again, may be corroborated, qualified, enriched or belied by the paralinguistic and kinetic configuration). Since the semantic form mostly overrides all others, it lays the more dangerous trap. The mediator should constantly remember that semantic “content” is but the semantic form of propositional content. He should remember that it is the LPIo he is after - which, indeed, he can only or mainly access on the basis of the relevant semantic representation, but which largely transcends it. What matters, in other words, is not the semantic form of propositional content, but noetic content itself. For many, here the problem would seem to be solved: the interpreter has understood the speaker’s motivation, intention and meaning meant (i.e. he has managed relevant LPIo/LPCo identity, even though he is not the speaker’s intended addressee), and has presumably managed to reverbalise his LPIi through a faultless Fi. Well, not quite: there remain a couple of hurdles to negotiate. For starters, we have the often neglected paralinguistic and kinetic configuration of the interpreter’s utterance - that which we normally call the interpreter’s “presence” or “presentation,” i.e. his ability to speak, to produce

4

See, for instance, Pöchhacker and Kadric (1999), Tebble (1999), and Meyer (2002).

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adequate speech acts5, which is the oral mediator’s counterpart to the translator’s textual competence. This ability entails, of course, the ability to express himself correctly, precisely and clearly in the right register and, therefore, to reproduce different registers, but, also, the ability relevantly to reproduce, if need be, all manner of mistakes. But there is more to it: Each and every component of expression can and should be attended to and practised separately. All too often in SI classes C is neglected, even though it is probably the single most decisive factor when it comes to the naturalness, intelligibility and, therefore, acceptability of an interpretation6. Fine. Let us assume that our student has overcome all those obstacles. So far he has travelled the following distance: WZ > Yy > LPIKo 6 [Fo(XmL,SmH,VmR,JmQ)CmEm]GPMVHtm UZ > LPCKo 6 Aa [6] ------------------------------------------------DVo-----------------------------------------------[6] WZ > Yy > LPIKi 6 [Fi(XnL,SnH,VnR,JnQ)CnEn]... -----------------------------DVi---------------------------

So far, in other words, the left and the centre of the mediating bridge have been negotiated. On the right-hand end, the interpreter must now analyse his own interlocutor’s attitude and the effect that the speaker is having on him through the interpretation, i.e. how the interlocutor is understanding, how much he is cooperating and why. Neglecting the speaker’s motivations and intentions (which are, however, the first thing we pay attention to in our own daily exchanges whenever anybody -and most especially a stranger- addresses us) leads to not understanding Fo as the initiation of a speech act by someone specific, out of a specific motivation, with a specific intention, here and now. Neglecting the interlocutor’s disposition (or reluctance) to cooperate, his ability to understand, and the effects that comprehension is having or is likely to have upon him (which, however, is the first thing we take into account in our daily exchanges whenever we address anybody - and most specially a stranger) leads too not understanding Fo as the initiation of a specific speech act addressed to someone specific, who also has a specific motivation and intention, here and now. It is not a matter of the interpreter pondering at this stage his interlocutor’s “culture” or “idiosyncrasy”: This is something that we will have taught each student to assess together with the speaker’s motivation and intentions. But he must also take stock of the social stakes and, especially, of any possible mismatches at the K level. He must also assess the interlocutor’s 5

That I am aware, the only authors to incorporate paralinguistic and kinetic/graphic configuration into an utterance’s intrinsic form are Nord (1991a and b) and Monacelli (1997). 6

As shown by Collados Aís1998) and Shlesinger (1994). © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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attitude and, ultimately, determine what counts as relevant identity for him, in order, on that basis, to come up with the aptest FiCnEn possible. Out of such an analysis, then, he will adopt his mediating strategy and choose his tactical options, giving unavoidable precedence to some participants over others: At a court of law, the accused, the judge, council for the defence, the prosecutor, the verbatim reporter, the security guards, each member of the jury, the public and the journalists are listening with different ears; in the conference room the interpreter’s Fi also meets different abilities and dispositions to understand. Not all of them have equal social weight in the specific situation, and it behoves the mediator to determine which one or which ones count for the purposes of relevant LPIo/LPCi identity. Let me stress the rhetorical and social importance of C -and, in the case of dialogue and consecutive interpretation, E- which is also decisive when it comes to get the message across, to achieve relevant LPIi/LPCi identity. In view of the decisive function of all factors, including paralinguistic and kinetic, around utterances proper (which, by the way, tend to be defective), the latter cannot but lose some of their specific weight. This is clearly seen in the model, where F has a role both central and relative. Oral “texts” too can be instrumental or documentary Proponents of absolute, come-what-may “fidelity” to “what the speaker says” represent the sourcierist camp of the profession: Those who maintain that the interpreter is invariably the speaker’s alter ego and cannot be anything but the speaker’s alter ego; since if the speaker has chosen to say or not to say in this or that way “there must be a good reason,” and who is the interpreter anyway to decide otherwise. As if each time a speaker opened his mouth to be interpreted he delicately and cunningly weighed every word, however awkward, inept or mistaken. As if, even in that case, the possibly different relevance and acceptability criteria by his new interlocutors did not count in the least. As if the speaker’s very motivations and pragmatic intentions were of no concern, As if, in the case of oral mediation, “words” counted more than anything else. It seems incredible that sourcierists, who are fewer and fewer in literary translation and have all but disappeared among pragmatic translators, still seem to constitute the majority among interpreters, especially simultaneous7. If in translation we admit skopostheorie without much tremor, why should it be a cause of dismay or dread in oral mediation, especially in simultaneous interpretation, in which cognitive limitations -let alone dialectal or foreign accents, unusual social or professional lects, mangled utterances, etc.- more often than not prevent any attempt at completeness, no matter how desirable? Why should interpretive use be the only alternative? What is in principle the problem with “translating” an expert’s awkward explanation at a seminar as descriptively as written instructions are 7

I know whereof I speak: I was a chief interpreter for the better part of fourteen years.

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normally translated for their users? I suspect that, for once, orality exhibits its practical “disadvantage” with respect to writing: Oral “texts” are never anonymous. It matters little if the ambassador is “saying” a text written by somebody else; or if the delegate is reading aloud an anonymous news clip: the speaker is there! The interpreter sees him and hears him. His indirect and direct interlocutors see him and hear him. And he sees them, and -sometimes even as his speech is being interpreted simultaneously- he sees and hears the interpreter. The speaker’s word weighs more onerously than the very Almighty’s: No dynamic equivalence when it comes to translating the co-present God; a God wearing thick spectacles and a bow tie, gaunt, monotonous, rambling and repetitive, perhaps... but present! And, may I ask, if the author of the unintelligible toaster instructions was there watching over our shoulders, would we then translate him documentarily? What if he started reading them aloud at a toaster-producers’ convention? I cannot quote relevant statistics, I am afraid, but I dare venture to say that the number of oral utterances with documentary value is infinitesimal - even though they are undoubtedly more rife in the more structured and formal situations in which the presence of a mediator is typically required. But even then, we do not speak to bequeath an eternal record of exactly what we have said and how exactly we have spoken. As a matter of fact, for that we normally write. The deposition by the accused before the court or the testimony by a witness has, no doubt, documentary value. But, the meeting’s secretary incidental intervention re tomorrow’s programme? A social worker’s explanation to an immigrant of certain social benefits? The narrative that the Thai tourist is desperately trying to fit into English to tell the Argentine police that his money, passport and ticket have been stolen? Why would oral “texts” be less manipulable than written ones? Why should the umpteenth speech of the day on the same subject, this time around from the lips of the third secretary of the Mission of Dumboland merit more reverence and deference than a sonnet by Rimbaud or a novel by Dumas? Of course, the co-presence of speaker and interlocutors brings in most fully face. The unknown and absent author’s of the tourist brochure is of no consequence. If the client protests the translator’s excessive frivolity, the latter can always try to convince him that the original is rubbish or, at best, unlikely to be accepted in the target culture. The face of the unknown and absent reader is of no concern either. This is another advantage of writing: everybody is anonymous, the speaker, his interlocutors, those of the translator, the translator himself, and sometimes even the very client - very much like at an orgy in the dark. In oral mediation, to boot, power or tenor also take a front seat. In other words, social relations appear at their rawest. These differences in the social situation affect, no doubt, the criteria determining what counts as relevant identity between intended and comprehended meaning. Ten years from now, when translating the speech that

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Bush gave immediately after the terrorist attacks of 9-11, 2001, we will be able nay, have- to take some “liberties” that would be unthinkable at the moment the speech act was initiated. The utterance will not have changed, Fo will remain exactly the same: only the sacramental aura of the situation will be diluted. Interpreted events have, in fact, quite a touch of the ritual. Even so, an oral mediator must decide which strategy is best or more advisable at each step. Averring that oral mediation -or, less dogmatically, simultaneous interpretingmust be always documentary is, as any assertion based on prejudice and not on a scientific analysis, a superstition. And yet it should be enough to watch any good consecutive interpreter at work in order to understand that a good interpretation is almost always instrumental: Without the immediacy of the reply still resounding in mediumterm memory, without the pressure of the speaker’s parallel utterance, the consecutive interpreter is the quintessential instrumental translator. And that is why those who have hit closer to the translatological nail are the theoreticians of consecutive interpretation. Surprisingly enough, many of the best consecutivist Hydes become uncompromising Jekylls upon stepping into the booth. Modes of interpreting Dialogue interpretation8 It is the oldest form of mediation, the only one that can be practised “naturally,” since a) it does not require literacy and, b) as opposed to consecutive and simultaneous interpretation, by separating the processes of speech comprehension and production “naturally,” it does not tax short- and mediumterm memory, demand extraordinary concentration, or require any reflex reconditioning - let alone divided attention: Its cognitive limitations are simply those of “natural” speech. Also, as Hatim and Mason (1997) point out, it relies more on the situational coordinates (what the authors and many others call “context”) than on “structure” (which would be the linchpin of consecutive interpretation) or on “texture” (the basic handle on discourse in SI). As a case in point, it is the form of mediation practised daily by the children of immigrants between their parents and neighbours, services- and goods-providers, social workers, etc. That is the reason why it lacks the social prestige and financial reward of -by definition simultaneous- conference interpreting. Yet, the fact that no neurophysiological and cognitive abilities enter into play that are different from those by any normal speaker of any age or social extraction in no way deprives this kind of interpretation of any of the essential attributes of interlingual mediation. As a matter of fact, it foregrounds them most glaringly generally much more than simultaneous or consecutive conference interpreting. Indeed, the dialogue interpreter (legal, community, etc.) normally deals with 8

Also called bilateral interpretation, except that I find it a misnomer: whispered interpretation is both simultaneous and bilateral. 174

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enormous social and cultural differences and, above all, with extremely asymmetrical power relations between individual interlocutors. Such sociocultural variety, moreover, spills over into the linguistic part of his hermeneutic ability: A dialogue interpreter will have to understand a much wider and less familiar variety of social, professional and geographic lects. The professional dialogue interpreter is the mediator par excellence who, literally, mediates, i.e. stands squarely in the middle, weighing, ideally with maximum care, the social effects of his mediation, which constantly tests his loyalty. Except for encounters in excelsis between big shots, where he is most “unnaturally” sitting behind and couching both forward and sideward, of all mediators, he is always a quintessentially ratified participant. The dialogue interpreter is often called upon to bridge the vast linguistic, cultural and social differences separating a judge from the illiterate suspect or a small child from the paediatrician, and even to take control over the whole exchange. It is no coincidence that during the last few years many of the most relevant practical insights and theoretical contributions have come, precisely, from dialogue interpreters, including those for the deaf. It is in DI, I submit, that my development of García Landa’s model proves most useful. If dialogue mediation were simply unconstrained oral translation, it would be the easiest thing in the world: even a bilingual child could manage and, within its “natural” hermeneutic and heuristic ability, it can indeed. The tremendous constraint is not cognitive but social: It lies, as we have seen, in the vast differences in power, culture, sophistication, interests, ability, willingness to cooperate, trust, and even sanity that the interlocutors can evince - to which is added the powerful psychological stress of having to deal with real, often vulnerable people and to help decide their lot. I shall limit myself to referring you to the relevant literature in my bibliography, dear reader; I only wish to stress that, with respect to the myriad conflicting claims on many a dialogue interpreter’s loyalty, and the dire consequences that any breach or mistake can have for real people in real life, the deontology of simultaneous conference interpreting or written translation is a simple couple of basic dos and don’ts. DI offers the ideal observation point to distinguish translation proper from actual mediation, which, no doubt, has translation as its core activity, but which normally seeks much more than simply re-saying in a second language what has been said in a first one, as profusely illustrated in the relevant literature. The dialogue interpreter cannot limit himself to understanding LPIos and making them understood as LPCis. More than any other mediator, more than any translator or consecutive or simultaneous interpreter -whether mediating between Heads of Government or between a hysterical mother and a paramedic at the scene of an accident where her child has been badly hurt- a dialogue interpreter must be first and foremost mindful of either extreme of the speech act: he must be as much aware as possible of the stakes for either interlocutor and for the institution that may “host” the speech act, of the motivations,

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intentions, resistance and effects that frame the act of speech communication proper. This includes, most notably, his own motivations and intentions, linked inextricably as they are to his own attitude towards both interlocutors and what they are saying to each other through him9. As I have pointed out, he, more than any other mediator, is there, visible and audible to all parties; even his clothes, personal hygiene and physical looks can become relevant and help or impede his interlocutors’ trust, and, therefore, the effectiveness of his mediation. Telephone interpreting I will only limit myself to mention this ever more widespread and crucial modality of dialogue interpreting. Obviously, the decisive advantage for users of interpretation is its immediate availability, especially in emergencies. Australia remains the pioneer in the field (yet another token of the high regard and status of the profession “down under” - which, needless to point out, goes hand in hand with its recognition as a vital cogwheel of the social machinery rather than as a nuisance, an afterthought or, at best, a matter of political expediency in international or interethnic affairs). Of course, almost by definition, events interpreted by telephone are brief and mostly one-to-one. Undoubtedly, from the cognitive point of view, what is felt most palpably is not to able to see and not being seen (Wadensjö (1999) offers one of the very few analyses of this new and fascinating modality). Consecutive interpretation In CI, the value of tm+n becomes unnatural (as opposed to DI, the interpreter must speak much later than the speaker), which may prevent the retention and reproduction of many propositional and non-propositional details. This objective restriction, basically due to the neurophysiological substrate of the retention and recall mechanisms, is compensated by a professional development of analytical ability, i.e. of the ability to grasp propositional structure and pragmatic intentions. This analytical ability (and not the ability to recall) is the one that, whether interpreting or not, we bring into play in order to understand, to contribute our half of the effort that allows for relevant LPI/LPC identity when we listen to monologic discourse or when we read any minimally sophisticated text. More apparently than in any other form of mediation, in CI having 9

Before you object to this assertion, dear reader, think of those Auschwitz survivors who had to interpret the likes of Heinrich Himmler, or the Jewish interpreters at the Adolph Eichmann trial twenty years later, or of this practitioner having to hear many an Argentine delegate denouncing the “anti-Argentine campaign” while his fellow countrymen were being tortured and made to disappear by the thousands, or what it must have been to sit at those interminable Security Council meetings while Thatcher and Galtieri sacrificed their cannon fodder on the Malvinas/Falklands. Think, moreover, of this practitioner learning from the lips of a Chilean witness presenting testimony before the Ad Hoc Group of the Human Rights Committee that two close friends had been recently murdered by Pinochet’s henchmen. And now think if I had been right there, rather than in a secluded booth. 176

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understood means, first and foremost, having understood structure: a sophisticated line of argumentation permeated by a pragmatic attitude. Structure is, by definition, a metarepresentation based on the linear comprehension of speech which alone can be stored in long-term memory. Intelligence lies, precisely, in the ability to metarepresent, of putting distant twos together, of identifying the system governing a usually untidy sequence of Landan acts - not everyone who understands a man’s speech can understand the man. This is no longer a “natural” ability: some people are incapable of it. If that is lacking, then interpretation becomes what it often sadly is: modular - a string of propositions that may, if serendipitously recalled and strung back together, add up to a cracked mirror of the original, but will never coalesce as the verbalisation of a structured sequence of LPIs. The practitioner -and especially the student- must therefore worry more about having understood than about being able to remember, since one cannot remember what one has not been able to understand. Why, then, such anxiety and eagerness to remember? Precisely because memory has its own neurophysiological constraints that cannot be controlled cognitively. The consecutive interpreter requires, no doubt, special training to overcome or palliate such cognitive limitations. The most effective instrument, as we know, are the notes, i.e. the graphic representation of certain LPIo clues that make it possible to evoke it in its relevant entirety. An effective instrument, indeed, provided it is used effectively. And there’s the rub: A note, as a knot in the handkerchief, is useful only if it does the trick, i.e. if it enables the subject to recall what is relevant, be it the population increase in Asia during the 15th century or a wedding anniversary10. The problem with notes never lies with the notes themselves (as it does not lie with the exact nature of the handkerchief or the knot), but with the criterion governing them. This brings us back to the basic ability that an interpreter must boast: the ability to analyse - itself the cornerstone of the ability to understand. To analyse motivations, intentions, arguments, positions, stakes - and not simply the specific LPIs and their verbalisations that speakers resort to in order to communicate “officially” with each other as a function of all of the above11. As always, this analysis must 10

A note, like a knot, must activate a whole gamut of knowledge and representations, of frames and scenarios: I am reminded of my anniversary and, without any need for additional knots, I remember that I must buy flowers, that my proprietor has told me she liked very much that ring that she saw in this shop, that I have to reserve a table at such restaurant, etc. I know interpreters who write down even de final “thank you”! 11

As Jones (1998:5 and foll.) rightly points out, the (good) interpreter is engaged in active listening, much more intensive and concentrated than any other interlocutor, even if the latter is much more interested in the communication than the interpreter himself. The interpreter’s role as a mediator forces him to prove publicly and on the spot that he has understood, analysed and assimilated thoroughly the original DVo (and not only its semantic vehicle), and, besides, that he has been able aptly to synthesise it. © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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develop at either end of a DVo. It does happen that the interpreter -and especially the student- loses sight of the social poles of communication between which he is called upon to mediate. Ontologically, cognitively and chronologically, this is the first reason why notes are taken ineptly. Although there is an additional aspect, which my development of García Landa’s model helps formalise: the kinetics of note-taking itself. An interpreter that spends all the time with his nose stuck into the pad, doodling rabidly without lifting up his eyes to look at the speaker and at his own future interlocutors, a) misses most of the pragmatic meaning conveyed kinetically by the speaker, b) fails to establish a pragmatically relevant relationship with both speaker and audience, c) prematurely disregards the decisive E of his imminent act of speech, and, most decisively, d) cannot possibly understand effectively: the more attention the interpreter devotes to writing, the less he can spare for understanding and, especially, metarepresenting meaning. Since due to the unnatural tm+n value, a consecutive interpreter has no way of retaining the phonomorphosyntactic chain (unless, again, he is a trained stenographer, but there are very few of them in the profession), the great trap is always semantic: When the novice interpreter has written down a word or concept and then cannot recall what exactly that word or concept was doing in the original speech, very often he puts together any which utterance to insert them - which normally leads straight into utter nonsense. Moreover, since noetic content is not linguistic, notes can be words in either language or in any third one, or in all of them at once, or -deverbalising the LPIo and transforming Fo into sheer E- in more or less iconic symbols, such as arrows; or in totally idiosyncratic marks or any other graphic device... so long as it later helps relevantly to recall noetic content - i.e. to re-apprehend the LPI (already peeled off the vanished Fo) and reverbalise it by means of a new Fi. Another element that is not to be overlooked, of course, is pragmatics. Notes are only helpful when it comes to noetic content: indeed, there is no reason to “note” anything else. What happens is that, once Fo has vanished from memory, the beginner interpreter (and more than just a few veterans) completely forgets that the speaker was joking, selling or lecturing. In fact, the loss of the pragmatic component reveals a deficient understanding. In other words, if the interpreter has not grasped pragmatic “meaning,” he has not understood relevantly, so that in the end LPIo[≠]LPCi. And if the problem is that he did understand it, but has now neglected to convey it, then he is no longer relevantly saying what he did understand, so, again LPIo[≠]LPCi. Lastly, we have the neurophysiological and cognitive features of memory. But here this model, centred on the social aspects of mediation, has nothing new to contribute. Simultaneous interpretation If in CI it is possible to observe in all their ontological splendour two separate but co-existent speech acts sharing the same noetic space, in SI the phenomenon 178

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is also apparent, even though this time around we are dealing with two overlapping acts, so much so that for all practical reasons we are right in calling this mode of interpretation simultaneous. According to García Landa’s unpublished experiments, there is, in fact, no such simultaneity, but a series of phases each lasting some 250 milliseconds so that the interpreter is speaking after the speaker and not together with him. Whether it is so or not, in some cases the interpreter anticipates the speaker and does indeed speak together with and even before him. It is obvious that a simultaneous interpreter is subject to different pressures. First, he must recondition his reflexes so as to be able to speak while listening and processing (or to do it in such a rapid succession that his attention must shift at 250 milliseconds intervals). Second, this task forces him to perform the diverse speech activities at a much higher speed than is normal. The fact is that a good professional simultaneous interpreter can master these difficulties and manage in most cases to produce normal discourse that sounds like an original and that evinces no pressure. Much has been ventured and little has been proved about what happens in the interpreter’s head and how he negotiates this seemingly impossible feat. In any event, this fascinating physical province lies without translation theory’s social realm12. In the case of SI, two crucial circumstances must be taken into account: one is that DVo and DVi overlap, so that the interpreter is constrained to understand and utter, as it were, “fragments” of an LP (the so-called unités de sense, which have proven so elusive to define13); another one is that the value of n in tm+n can become negative when the interpreter anticipates the speaker (a natural ability that it is most essential to recover in the booth, and most especially in SI for the media, where often the interpreter must finish exactly with or even a tad before the speaker)14. The specificity of SI lies, precisely, in this temporal overlapping of both acts, which makes it the most complex and difficult mediating activity from the psychomotor and cognitive point of view,

12

Which in no way diminishes the dedicated work of the likes of Gran, Darò, Kurz, MoserMercer, Tommola and many other colleagues adamant on helping our neurophysiological friends.

13

Especially if one looks for them in Fo, since comprehension depends also on extralinguistic, virtual factors, such as K, that cannot be segmented and gravitate upon the subject of comprehension in a sui generis way. In any event, there are units of sense that are already such for the speaker (who knows where he is going), but not yet for the interlocutor who cannot but understand on line. Nevertheless, a smart or attentive interlocutor, especially if he is in the know, can grasp units of sense even before they are uttered or completed: Ceteris paribus, then, it all depends on the hermeneutic skills, which vary from interlocutor to interlocutor each time. 14

A third, decisive difference is that the interpreter is both present and absent, distant and mostly invisible in his booth, i.e. alienated from the situation in which he must mediate. © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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i.e. the most unnatural15. If in the case of CI we were faced with the antinatural demands on short-term memory, here, this kind of memory can take a rest16, but the divided (or breathtakingly commuting) attention that replaces it exerts such an extreme pressure on the interpreter that it cannot but detract from each and every one of the competing tasks that he must accomplish at once. Also, the fact that he must unnaturally rely on such a flimsy linchpin as texture can make his comprehension of structure more difficult: if it is true that in spontaneous speech a speaker builds up structure on the go (although he often has a pretty well structured idea of what he means to say), in multilingual political conferences, where positions (and sometimes even speeches) are often rehearsed in advance, structure plays a much more decisive role than in “natural” situations. Hatim and Mason point out that “the simultaneous interpreter concentrates on processing current input, [so that] there is likely to be less matching of current input with previous text than is the case in other forms of processing such as listening to a monologue or, especially, reading” (1997: 63).

This difference in processing is due to the fact that the interpreter is not just understanding as a normal interlocutor, but making his on-line understanding manifest and open to scrutiny and criticism (Hatim and Mason refer to him as an “accountable listener”). They add that “the simultaneous interpreter is generally denied the luxury of contextual inference and runs the risk of being misled by close adherence to textural patterns of the source text” (ibid.:68) - which makes a global assessment of the situation and social stakes and a constant analysis of its dynamics all the more vital. My theory, I think, provides a more complete explanation: The simultaneous interpreter must make his linear comprehension of original speech manifest before he has had enough information and time to metarepresent meaning. So much so that he is often reduced to understanding and spitting out mini-LPIs produced every 250 15

This has been both its advantage and its shortcoming as an arena of thinking on translation. On the one hand, its many constraints brook no niceties, it is no-nonsense translation - this has allowed conference interpreters to be at the forefront of theoretical thinking and come up with the Parisian revolution that culminates in García Landa’s theory. On the other hand, its very unnaturalness makes it extremely a-typical, which explains the interpretivists’ theoretical disdain for or awe at literary translation. Literary translation, by the way, is also unnatural and a-typical, which also explains the chasm between translation as seen from the interpreter’s cagey booth and from the philologist’s squeaky armchair. 16

Which is why I find the fact that, at most schools, CI is eliminatory most problematic. If a student does not show enough ability to grasp structure (let alone understand the language), there is indeed no point in letting him go any further. But if he fails due to an improper notetaking technique, i.e. because he has not been able to deal with medium-term memory problems, I cannot see why he should be prevented from showing what he is capable of when medium-term problems do not even arise. I for one, am a pretty decent simultaneous interpreter who has never done a CI in his life and would not now how to begin to take notes. 180

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milliseconds - this is, of course, better than spitting out “words,” and mostly enough - but not always (and never ideal)17. Now we can understand the functional importance of décalage: the greater the distance between linear LPIo comprehension and linear LPIi production, the better the chances of having metarepresented more significant segments of discourse. This, however, clashes with the evanescence both of “words” and of “units of sense.” No wonder García Landa missed the postperceptual aspect of comprehension: His acknowledged empirical base -simultaneous interpretation- does not provide the best window on speech production and comprehension from the decisive standpoint of the metacommunicative purposes of communication! And there is more: a normal listener (i.e. a listener who is personally interested in understanding what the speaker is trying to say and do by saying) is not only understanding an utterance on line: he is actively metarepresenting meaning and intentions, incorporating newly processed information into a vast and complex system of presuppositions, constantly checking what he hears against what he knows and expects. A normal hearer activates, therefore, powerful logic filters sieving input from the speaker: he is a critical interlocutor. More than any other mediator, a simultaneous interpreter -even if also personally interested, as can happen when a subject or argument captures his imagination- often cannot spare enough of the additional effort required, especially if such effort is made more strenuous by an insufficient hermeneutic package. When the mediator is working under excessive stress, or in a hurry, or half-heartedly, or when tired, or when he has no real interest in what is being said or, worse, when he is bored or irritated, his hermeneutic guard goes to sleep or simply rebels, and the simultaneous interpreter is the one least able to shake it up or down. This is, I suspect, the reason for many -perhaps most- mistakes. And this is the reason that I insist so much in the students’ understanding as if personally interested - i.e. in their understanding critically. As I pointed out, of all the forms of mediation, SI is the only one to require an initial reconditioning and subsequent maintenance of basic reflexes and the one where age tells most tellingly (it is obvious that SI depends on cognitive and neurophysiological support more than any other form of mediation). In this respect, however, the model has nothing to contribute, except the convenience of tm+n to reflect décalage. It does, nevertheless, have a lot to say when if comes to the generally communicative and strictly linguistic components of the speech act. Basically, a simultaneous interpreter must take stock of the same elements as his consecutive colleague (after all, the process of 17

Precisely because it is normally enough for an effective (if not necessarily optimum) performance, many an outstanding practitioner and teacher -notably Baigorri, with whom we crossed theoretical swords in front of his students at Salamanca- asserts that, in view of the many things he has to see to and do, it is not worth the simultaneous interpreter’s while to pay too much attention to the metacommunicative level. Others -not as outstanding- claim that it is impossible - impossible for them, that is. © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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comprehension is always the same). The advantage of this model is that, by incorporating prosody and register at the utterance level, as well as the latter’s paralinguistic and kinetic configuration, it allows for a global and thorough analysis of elocution. Specifically, the model explains that there is no DV without F, nor F without C, nor C without E - even in the booth. On the one hand, voice modulation, pause management, rhythm, tempo, and clarity of articulation are decisive both for the intelligibility and for the acceptability of the interpreter’s speech by his audience. All too often, this factor is neglected. There are teachers and practitioners who prefer an ill-articulated, lustreless, machine-gunned and monotonous Fi, but calqued, at least semantically, from Fo, rather than an enunciation where Fi and E harmoniously complement each other, that is easy to understand, pleasant to listen to, idiomatic, natural - and, needless to say, relevant18. On the other hand, while it is true that for the delegate in the room who cannot see the interpreter the value of E is zero19, the practitioner, even if he wishes otherwise, cannot do without it. Training must take this fact into consideration and see to it that the student takes advantage of it, since kinetics is most decisive for the acoustic cohesion of the semiotic stimulus (i.e. E determines C!), even despite the possible awkwardness of Fi, as is also the case in spontaneous speech20. As Seleskovitch and Lederer had seen it, it all boils down to nothing short of teaching the students to recover the spontaneity of their own speech, and there is simply no such thing as spontaneous speech without natural C or E. It is true that grasping the structure of linear speech while articulating one’s own is, perhaps, the most difficult part of SI. Only the best practitioners 18

Some years ago I had my first experience as a panelist at the graduation exams at one of the best schools in Europe. Although I was not supposed to take part in the exams from German, I asked to be present as a virgin user. What a revealing experience! One of the students had, apparently, said it all and in perfectly acceptable Italian, but I did not understand anything at all, such was the awkwardness of C. During the deliberations it was decided to listen to the recording. Now, without even the interpreters’ face, and once the jurors who had access to the original German speech had all but forgotten it, the awkwardness of elocution became more apparent: C was so inept, that Fi could not help - understanding was achieved slowly at the price of an effort as enormous as it was unnecessary. This experience, by the way, convinced me of the absolute need to have net users both in class and at exams. 19

Although not if he can see the interpreter. At the Soria symposium where we presented what was then called the García Landa/Viaggio model (Viaggio 1998b and c, García Landa 1998b), the booths were in full view of the public. At one point García Landa and I had to interpret into Spanish that luminary of our profession, Wadi Keiser. Of course, we are both Latin and both become possessed while interpreting, which transpired most glaringly in or histrionic Es, which in turn contrasted markedly with the speaker’s Helvetian sobriety. At the end of the meeting, some users told us that we had unduly called attention upon ourselves. We were not to blame, really: the booths were on stage right next to the speaker, so that the audience could always see him and us without shifting their eyes.

20

An observation shared by Jones (1998); see also Viaggio (1997).

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are able to free themselves from the cobwebs of modularity. Many do so intuitively, but it is much more efficient to get the student into the habit of distancing himself from the speaker’s linearity (which necessitates, of course, a certain distance in time, a certain décalage). Experience shows that, initially at least, it is practically impossible to make this analysis while speaking. One thing is mathematically unavoidable: the more a student speaks, the less he will be able to think. And fie the mediator who speaks without thinking: it’s his mouth kills the interpreter! During the first stages of his training -initially in CI and later in SI- the student must be absolutely forbidden to open his mouth without having first thought what he is going to say: Exactly the same way that, as a spontaneous speaker, he would never spit out a preposition without having its destination in the anteroom of his conscience, or an auxiliary verb orphaned from the semantically loaded one, a student should pay a fine each time he lets go of the first without having decided on the latter. To make things even worse, the resulting antinatural pause that no spontaneous speaker would allow himself, such as ‘I’m going to... huh... huh... Paris’ rather than ‘I’m going... to Paris sounds more than an out-of-tune trumpet in an adagio for strings. Whispered interpretation Physically, simultaneous whispered interpretation is the most exhausting mode of interlingual mediation. It is the kind of interpreting normally resorted to when one (or a sufficiently small group) of the participants at an event does not understand at least one of the languages spoken and there is no booth to provide conventional SI. Whispered SI differs from its traditional counterpart in several decisive aspects: the most important one being that, to make things worse, a speech activity that is in itself cognitively antinatural also becomes antinatural paralinguistically and kinetically. The whispering interpreter’s resilience does not depend on his linguistic or intellectual ability but on his phonatory organs. It is, also, socially antinatural, since the interpreter is almost glued to his interlocutor (whose personal hygiene is never guaranteed) in an outright promiscuous situation - and position, sitting behind and leaning sideways toward his client. Whispered SI demands a maximum condensation of form: Since his own voice prevents him from hearing the speaker’s, the interpreter has no way of listening and speaking strictly at the same time; on the other hand, it is physically suicidal to whisper at full speed. Of course, the interlocutor himself adopts a more lenient expectancy threshold, which in turn modifies what counts as relevant identity. The competing efforts The students’ obsession for recalling Fo goes hand in hand with their obsession for “understanding” it. Indeed, whoever does not understand the linguistic chain articulating the utterance will hardly grasp the relevant LPIo. But, as we know, understanding language does not automatically lead to understanding sense (Fo and LPIo are, after all, different babies). It is therefore necessary that the student © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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not waste any time understanding language: language comprehension must be automatic - as in spontaneous speech. The lesser the effort to understand an utterance’s linguistic form, the greater the effort that can be devoted to analysing its content: the effort at understanding must shift from Fo to LPIo. Next, it is necessary to automate as far as possible LPIo comprehension itself, so as to devote greater attention to the mediating essence of the task: analysing relevance of both form and content of an LPIo for the mediator’s addressees in the specific situation and relevantly transmuting LPCo into LPIi. This effort should be the decisive one. In the future, its aptness and efficacy ought to be a professional’s decisive speciality, at the service of which he will put his necessary comprehension, memory and elocution abilities. Of course, as this effort becomes itself automatic, more processing capacity is left to see to the precision, correctness and elegance of Fi and the naturalness of C. This latter effort can also be automated (again, as in spontaneous speech), so that the interpreter has spare energy to cope with the most difficult day without damage to his sanity. Let me stress that the efforts at understanding and producing utterances are those that interpretation shares most basically with spontaneous speech, so that they are the most apt to be automated. The interpreter’s effort at understanding an LPIo, however, differs from that of a normal speaker’s in the decisive fact that the LPIo is not addressed to him. Identically, the interpreter’s effort to make himself understood differs from that of a normal speaker’s in that his LPIi is, strictly speaking, not his: a mediator says what “the other one” wants to say. Both these latter efforts are, therefore, more difficult to automate for a mediator than for a spontaneous speaker. But the most difficult of all, the one necessitating the most practical training based on a solid theoretical knowledge, is that of transmuting LPCo into LPIi - it is here that the true mettle of the interlingual intercultural mediator shines. The merit of Gile’s model21 (listening/analysing, memory, and elocution) is that it allows us better to understand the problem of divided attention. To my mind, however, it suffers from a decisive flaw: it lacks, of all things, the communicative analysis effort necessary not so much for interpretation proper as for mediation. There are, thus, four rather than three competing efforts. Again, the omission is not fortuitous: in the work of the great majority of scholars who, like Gile, reject or underestimate la théorie du sens, the socially decisive aspect of interpretation as mediated communication ends up thrown overboard. Such is the risk when the reality of interpretation is sought in the mediator’s neurons. Personally, I agree with Gile22 as to the need to leave behind personal, intuitive, impressionistic approaches and proceed to a systematic research of our object of study. Except that our object of study -even if rooted, as any other activity involving the central nervous system, in the functions of the brain- is not 21

Published many times, among others, Gile 1985a, 1988, and 1995b and c.

22

1989, 1991b, 1994b, 1995a and 2000, among others.

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neurophysiological but social. Studying the neurophysiological support is, no doubt, necessary, nay, indispensable when analysing how such a complex activity is physically possible, but let us not forget about music and analyse instead the wood that the violin is made of - or the violinist’s cerebral cortex, for that matter. I do think, on the other hand, that the social aspect has partially eluded some “liberal artists” too23. Many proponents of la théorie du sens themselves neglect the mediating essence of translation and interpretation. It is not fortuitous either: As I myself, most of them hail from international meeting rooms where cultural and social differences are very much masked. What I find most remarkable, however, is that those most aware of the intercultural nature of interlingual mediation, beginning with Nida (not by chance, interested in evangelical translation), all the way to skopostheorie -including Nord’s notion of loyalty and Pym’s concept of translation as transfer, as well as the manipulation school and Venuti’s criticism thereof- have themselves disregarded, in one way or another, sense as the cognitive and emotive content of any speech act (which, as I said, can hardly be reduced to the “information offer” referred to by Reiss and Vermeer). As I see it, the root of the problem lies in a hesitation among all those conflicting vectors pulling at every act of communication: the pole of the speaker (WZ, Yy, LPIK), the semiotic stimulus (FCE), the situational features (GPM, VHt), and the pole of the addressee (UZ, LPCK, Aa), all of which are as many decisive aspects of the totality of a speech act. The physical presence of the simultaneous interpreter in all kinds of interpreting A factor that has not been thoroughly researched and that distinguishes most markedly interpretation from translation is that of the social consequences of the interpreter’s physical co-presence with his interlocutors (except, of course, in the cases of remote SI and telephone DI). Normally, whoever reads a translation, the work of an absent mediator, is not judging it - rather, he reads it as an original, even if he is aware that it is a translation. In isolated cases (for instance, at international organisations or translation classes), users do compare translations with originals and with each other, but these instances are tiny drops in the ocean of translated texts. It may happen that the reader of a translation criticises it, but the translator is not present, nor could he be, since in the overwhelming majority of pragmatic, but also literary, texts the reader does not know or care who the translator was. The interpreter, instead, is identifiable here and now. So much so that it is a common occurrence for dialogue interpreters to find themselves in the uncomfortable position of having their users take them for autonomous interlocutors, which makes their task considerably more difficult, especially in the legal context. Even in the case of conference SI, with anywhere between ten and thirty interpreters in four or ten different and often remote 23

See Salevski (1996). © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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booths, their voice renders them present, and it often happens that a delegate in the room establishes eye contact with his turjumans. In some situations, there is a scission of the speaker’s motivations, pragmatic intentions and willingness to cooperate, with a part oriented toward his direct interlocutors and another to the interpreter. In other words, the speaker, aware that he is being interpreted, can address partly the interpreter (in multilingual meetings, normally the one into what he considers to be the language of his main indirect interlocutors, which tends to be English) and partly the other delegates in the room. It is the typical case of the suspecting speaker, who presumes (it is impossible) to follow the interpreter closely to check whether the latter is not cheating him of a single syllable, whether he is using all the cognates that he, the speaker, expects, and who stops in mid clause to wait for the interpretation. And it is also the case with the wary user, who compares, if he can, what he believes he understands in the original with the interpretation (a phenomenon, by the way, that happens also in translation, when the commissioner who knows a bit of the foreign language compares the original with the translator’s text to check whether he has translated “all the words”). Thus, the speaker produces his own speech act and judges, at the same time, the interpreter’s, whilst the user participates (or thinks that he participates) simultaneously in two acts: one initiated by the speaker and another initiated by the interpreter - always with the intention of “monitoring” the interpretation. The reverse, however, also happens: There are speakers who constantly verify that they are speaking clearly, or who are genuinely grateful, and there are cooperative listeners. One of the analyses that the oral mediator must make is the kind of cooperation (or resistance) that he is bound to meet on either side and see to it that he earns their trust. This is one of the decisive factors that make the interpreter’s presence in the room a must. Remote interpreting, in which interpreters would be totally isolated from the speaker and his and their interlocutors, is bound to add enormously to stress24. In any event, there is a whole part of professional deontology that has to do with the way an interpreter relates to the protagonists in the communication situation and with how to react to both justified and unjustified criticisms.

24

In January 2000, the UN conducted an ambitious remote interpretation experiment: a twoweek, six-language session of the Commission of Human Rights Working Group on a Draft Optional Protocol to the Convention on the Rights of the Child, held at the Palais des Nations in Geneva was interpreted from Vienna by a team of staff interpreters. It worked for the delegates, but interpreters found it extremely frustrating, irritating and stressful. The two biggest complaints were the image (which can eventually be perfected) and “not being there” (which cannot be helped at all). For those interested in the details, the relevant UN document is GE.99-01785. A second experiment, carried out in New York in April 2001, yielded identical results, even though this time around the interpreters were “more” there, in a neighbouring room. Another experiment, with basically the same results, was carried out at the European Commission in early April 2001. 186

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Archetypical social settings25 Legal interpreting Legal interpreting is characterised by its relatively strict structure, a well-nigh self-contained microworld that an interpreter must be thoroughly familiar with, in which obtains a mix of all modes of interpretation with objectively different notions of relevance as a function of the direction of mediation. Mikkelson (2000) provides and excellent and most accessible introduction to the subject based on US practice, but she fails to distinguish theoretically required relevant identity from what is objectively possible or really necessary. The abstract requirement of absolute fidelity to everything, though understandable, is totally unrealistic, particularly in view of the massive demands of interpreters between most languages -and dialects- and English, which necessitates resorting to many people who have no other qualifications than a minimum linguistic ability. I happened to take part in the panel of experts who designed and administered the Spanish exam for the State of New Jersey in 1989/90. Among the tens of interpreters who passed it with me as a member of the examination panel, only a handful were really able to provide enough relevant - let alone optimal identity. Most of them had no academic training whatsoever and many did not have college education either. Necessity was, as always, the stepmother of virtue, and standards had to be such as to allow for an uncomfortable compromise between quantity and quality: It is only natural whenever supply must catch up overnight with sudden demand. At the beginning, now well-established conference interpreting had to go through the same birth pangs (and it still is and will be going through them with any language that all of sudden wakes up to find itself international). This, however, should not make us lose sight of our North ensuring truly competent mediation by truly competent mediators trained according to the best insights into communication, whose expert opinion and experience becomes the basis of scientifically arrived at professional norms ultimately extrapolated as expectancy norms. But barring this objective limitation, it is simply not true that interpretation for the defendant when utterances are not addressed to him and he is not expected to react to them must be as meticulously faithful in all non-noetic aspects as interpretation of the defendant or certain witnesses. The defendant and the witnesses are interpreted for the “people” - i.e. the State as represented by its Judiciary as represented at the Court. A defendant’s or key witness’s hesitations, slips of the tongue, and social register, for instance, are highly relevant for the Court, since their credibility is always relevantly at stake, but the slips or hesitations by the Judge when passing sentence or overruling an

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Roy (2000:44 and foll.) offers a most relevant complementary taxonomy along the interactional dimension, distinguishing basically between single speaker events and conversational events © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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objection are not that relevant for the defendant - as far as the defendant is concerned, the judge’s credibility is never relevantly at stake. The legal interpreter at court is thus engaged in two asymmetrical series of speech acts: one - public, where on behalf of the defendant or a witness he addresses everybody and their aunt, another - private, where he addresses only the defendant or the witness. Even if this second act is monitored by a third party, I doubt whether anybody would notice let alone object to the Judge’s stammering or false starts not being faithfully reproduced26. But I am loath to step on more expert toes than mine and stand to be corrected. It is interesting to note that at the International Court of Justice, the International Tribunal for Crimes in the Former Yugoslavia, the European Court of Human Rights, the Lockerbie trial at Utrecht (Scottish jurisdiction over Arab defendants tried in the Netherlands) - all legal settings if there ever were any, given the international character of the events, it never occurred to the respective organisers to recruit anybody but conference interpreters, on the assumption, I assume, that they would be the most proficient at providing SI, regardless of their legal credentials - or, rather, entire lack thereof. Evidently, mode carries more weight than thematic and social expertise: indeed, a competent simultaneous interpreter can learn the legal ropes more easily than a competent legal interpreter who has no training in SI can recondition his reflexes (which may be impossible, since not everybody can). This explains the higher social prestige of conference interpreting - I submit that, in the end, it is simply a matter of mode. Since conference interpreting is, nowadays, synonymous with SI, whereas legal and other non-conference settings, including the media, are not immediately associated with it, it is conference SI that carries the social and financial day. But, I hope, the situation will soon change, and the Australian model will prevail.

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See, in this respect, Mason (2001) on triadic exchanges, especially the article by Mason & Stewart. Something similar happens in media interpreting: the guest is interpreted “for the people,” whilst the host is interpreted privately. 188

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Medical interpreting Since I lack the relevant experience and the specialised literature is rife27, I shall refrain from an exhaustive discussion. This type of interpretation -that can evince a widely varying degree of structuration, even despite the fact that the microworld remains relatively stable- bestows upon the mediator an exceptional responsibility, since differences in power, culture, gender, religion, age and social origin between physician, interpreter and patient become foregrounded. This is the paradigmatic case in which a mediator has as fundamental task not only to enable communication but to facilitate it. For starters, the mediator must be fully aware of the patient’s possible resistance not only to understand, but even to allow himself to be treated. And he must also see too it that the patient always understands relevantly. It can be adduced, of course, that the physician knows what he is doing, what and why he asks, and how to analyse the answers, but the praxis of most mediators belies it: many Galens are completely ignorant of certain cultural factors and sensitivities, and, as we shall see, even lack elementary courtesy. In any event, mediators must also deal with paramedic and administrative staff, and here the power relationships between the interpreter and the institution’s representative may well shift in favour of the former. A key element specific to this type of situation is the delicate balance that a mediator must strike between the two conflicting roles that deontology requires: objectivity and, whenever he deems that a patient is not been properly addressed or taken care of, advocacy. (An aggravating circumstance, as pointed out by Pöchhacker and Kadric (1999), is that often the mediators resorted to in this kind of situations are far from professional.) In order to illustrate the enormous complexity of this fascinating sphere of mediational praxis I shall limit myself to three of the many examples quoted by Shiva Bidar-Sielaff, Jane Kontrimas, Cynthia Roat and Karin Ruschke at the Medical Interpreters as Advocates panel during the 44th ATA Annual Conference held in Phoenix, Arizona, from 5 to 8 November 2003, which gave rise to a heated discussion between the defenders of the interpreter as mediator and the proponents of his absolute impartiality - or, if you prefer, indifference. The first two cases are particularly revealing by their basic similarity and circumstantial disparity. First: A very humble fifteen-year old, HIV-infected young man comes to the hospital for treatment and the doctor addresses him most scornfully. The interpreter realises that the patient -who, to boot, suffers from depression- cannot defend himself. She decides then to assume the responsibility to censure out the physician’s brutality, so that the young man does not become aware that he has been used like a piece of trash. After the interview, she takes the doctor severely to task and threatens to denounce him before the hospital’s management. Second: This time around the patient is a 27

See, for instance, Cambridge (1999), Meyer (2001), Miguélez (2001), Pöchhacker and Kadric (1999), Tebble (1999), and Wadensjö (1998 and 2001). © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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forty-five year old Russian college graduate who is perfectly capable to put anyone in their place. Upon taking his leave, the physician says to her “Good bye and, by the way, your mother wears army boots.” Instead of translating, the interpreter tells the patient that “He has made a very rude remark”, to which the patient, who speaks some English replies “Thank you Doctor for teaching new idiomatic expression,” with which she saves the mediator’s face and duly smashes that of the physician. These examples clearly show how in analogous situations professional interpreters adopt different tactics as the social coordinates of power and acceptability vary. Only a theory of translation as a subtype of interlingual mediation can accommodate these phenomena. Whatever our assessment of the behaviour in the specific circumstances by either mediator above, it is obvious that the purpose consciously -or, more often than not, unconsciously- pursued is relevant identity between meaning as meant and as comprehended – in both cases above, relevant to the patient, whose active advocacy (covert in the first case and overt in the second one) the mediator assumes. But the most surprising case is the following one: One of the panellists tells that she is called upon to mediate between a patient whose leg is to be amputated and the nurse in charge of readying him for surgery. The nurse is preparing a leg, but the patient -an old man of low social status and scant education- insists that it is the wrong one. The nurse tries to appease him by telling him that his nervousness is a side effect of medication and that everything is in order. The interpreter, who has helped the patient in his interviews, knows that he is right and says so. The nurse shows her testily the written instructions she has received. The mediator demands to speak to the physician on duty. The latter confirms the instructions and orders the nurse to proceed. The mediator then puts her foot down and warns that either they call the surgeon or she is not moving. The situation has become extremely tense. Both doctor and nurse feel that their face is seriously threatened and do not want to give in, but the mediator does not flinch. The surgeon is finally summoned and, indeed, the instructions are wrong. As we can see, mediation could not have been more active or overt in order that both doctor and nurse relevantly understand the patient. For this, the interpreter assumes full responsibility and intervenes herself on behalf of the patient, more as his representative than as a mediator. It is interesting to note that, in this case, the interpreter “burns her ships” in behalf of a supreme loyalty to the patient -and, indirectly, to the hospital that has recruited her, which stands to avoid a catastrophic malpractice suit- that is more firmly rooted in her ethics as a human being than in her deontology. This is an instance in which we can clearly see the decisive role played -ultimately but constantly- by the mediator’s own conscious and unconscious motivations.

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Conference interpreting Since it is the modality I know better, it will occupy an undeservedly prominent space. With all its visibility, statistically speaking, conference interpreting is an epiphenomenon. Lately some important historical studies have been published (Gaiba 1998 y 1999, Baigorri 1999 and 2000). Yet, to my mind, the sociology of international multilingual conference interpreting is at least as important as its history and much more relevant theoretically. At first glance, we can observe that international conferences are also a very structured kind of meeting (although not as much as courts of law), where social and discursive practices are governed by clear social norms and by written regulations. These social and dialogic structures -which are still to be studied in depth- are part of the knowledge of the microworld that a conference interpreter is expected to become familiar with each time. In present day practice, conference interpreting takes place basically in two overlapping settings: technical and political. The main difference between the twain lies in participation, which in the former tends to be personal rather than institutional, and the degree of cooperation: At purely technical meetings, say, medical congresses, participants, for the most part, genuinely come to discuss, to listen and to learn about their relevant sphere of activity and knowledge. Relevance is relatively evident and shared, whilst conflicts are personal rather than institutional. Political conferences, on the other hand, tend to be by definition overtly or covertly confrontational: participants are there to negotiate on the basis of conflicting interests rather than to discuss problems objectively. As interlocutors become less than ideally forthcoming, the relative weight of semantic form and register increases: In any conflict situation, where face becomes more and more divergent, speakers tend to choose their words more carefully and interlocutors tend to pay more attention to them which, to my mind, explains Pearl’s extreme timidity: A practitioner interpreting from Russian into English at the UN during all of the cold war, constantly monitored by invariably hostile speakers, the media, the highest echelons of the Administration, ten or fifteen secret services and everybody else must have a very special personal experience - as special as it is exceptional. As all social phenomena, conference interpreting is a prototypical category with fuzzy edges. It can be defined as interpreting (mostly simultaneous and mostly multilingual) in social situations of a deliberative type in which it is usually necessary to interpret a series of “one-to-many” interventions. This would therefore encompass, among a myriad others, not only the prototypical UN, NATO or Islamic Conference cases, but also legal contexts such as the International Court of Justice, specialised symposia and media interpreting. It is obvious that an interpreter does not require special cognitive abilities in order to interpret for several interlocutors instead of just one, the “one-to-many” characterisation becomes objectively relevant, though, if we understand that it practically necessitates SI, especially if more than one language is to be interpreted into or from, which explains the confusion between © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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cognitive mode and social setting. Also, since international seminars and symposia are ad hoc meetings and SI is resorted to only occasionally in the national courts, conference interpreting has become associated with international organisations hosting numberless conference-type meetings - whence the relevance of treating this kind of interpreting as a special category. Conference interpretation at international organisations After legal interpretation, conference interpreting at international organisations is quite probably the most stable and structured form of interlingual mediation. Indeed, professional CI and SI started off as conference interpreting at the Komintern, the League of Nations and the International Labour Office, later to become synonymous with conference interpreting, whereby mode became for all practical purposes equated to social setting. It should be noted, however, that SI becomes established as the main mode in multilingual (as opposed to merely bilingual) communication at the Nuremberg trial at which practitioners acted not as conference- but as court interpreters. The Nuremberg trial proved, therefore, a most atypical cradle for the practice, profession and discipline of conference interpreting. The profession of conference interpreter as it is known today was effectively launched when the United Nations and its offshoots adopted SI in the late forties. Conference interpretation at international organisations such as the United Nations differs from all other modes in that delegates, always relatively numerous, tend to share a specific culture, typical of each meeting and very similar to that of all others, and, at the same time, a microworld that is very precise and clearly demarcated. This microworld is so specific that we can say that among the delegates, as between them and the staff who caters to them, there are, for all practical purposes, no relevant individual differences at the WZ, K, P, M and UZ levels28. Communication takes place, then, basically among peers, without any power considerations entering decisively into play. The intercultural element loses thus much of its relevance - a most paradoxical fact if we consider that it is only at this kind of meeting that up to fifteen -and soon twenty or more- different languages are spoken. The interpreter faces, therefore, a relatively homogeneous situation, featuring a terminologically structured M, at which certain special rituals are observed. That fundamental difference between international conference and dialogue interpreting, which is more intimate, is due to the more “impersonal” nature of communication at most international meetings, which cannot but mirror itself in the very kinds of speech acts that obtain. Obviously, as the number of participants is reduced and, especially, as the mediator is able to identify his specific interlocutors or, better, finds himself talking to one alone, communication becomes more natural. Still, the mere fact that the mediator is physically separated from his interlocutors -albeit by a 28

In Hallidayan terms, we could say that the differences in tenor are much less marked and that there obtains, moreover, a relative field uniformity. 192

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pellucid pane- cannot but conspire against the naturalness of his own acts of speech. As pointed out, the participants, who tend to be on an equal social, cultural, professional and administrative footing, more than expressing individual thoughts or feelings, act as spokesmen for the more abstract and depersonalised interests of the governments or institutions they represent. That in turn explains that the LPs they exchange tend to be transparently propositional, so that the phonomorphosyntactic and semantic configuration of F at times becomes completely irrelevant. However, the opposite can also be true (if far less often than many practitioners believe). When more delicate political points are being made and nuances become of the essence, the simultaneous conference interpreter has to be as mindful of his own Fi as a legal translator, which in real time can be extremely difficult. Another fact that impacts dramatically the comparability of Fo and Fi is that many, if not most, speakers have no choice but to speak in a language other than their mother tongue, which at times they manage barely, so that their LPIos are very difficult to grasp on the basis of their syntactically unidiomatic, semantically awkward and prosodically blurred Fos. This explains that many delegates who understand the language theoretically being spoken rush to switch on to the interpretation into any other language they know: They are sure that the interpreter, having taken all the pains to understand the LPI, will now make a much better job at verbalising it than the speaker himself (which again proves the ontological difference between meaning meant and meaning as linguistically signified through the units of any given language). The speech acts by international delegates (and most especially in discussions that are no such thing, where more than one comes to read out the speech someone else has prepared for them, but not to listen to the one someone has prepared for others) are much more akin to the anonymous pragmatic texts that plague translation students: The speaker’s personal motivation is relegated to the background, relinquishing its place to the economic and political motivation of the institution speaking through his lips by means of a pseudo-oral speech, as a rule awfully delivered. At most so-called general debates, all that the interpreter and the audience get is a string of monologues basically addressed to la galerie back home, witness the last speakers of the day, lackadaisically mumbling to an empty room. Only in the genuinely negotiating fora (and there are, indeed, many, especially, I am told, at the European level), where interlocutors dialogue in a much more intimate and personal environment, the speaker’s immediate personal motivation and pragmatic intentions continue to hold sway. The fact remains that, compared to the real world of DI, interpretation as practised at international political conferences takes place in the most rarefied, unnatural social environment. As a matter of fact, at least in the case of the organisations in the UN system, interpretation into languages other than English

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tends mostly to be a matter of sheer political expediency or prestige. Very few international delegates cannot understand English, and most of them speak it decently enough to wade through the murkiest of political waters. This has a great demoralising effect on practitioners into such languages as Spanish, who are seldom listened to, and then out of sheer comfort, simply because they are there, but not because they are truly indispensable for communication - as rightly pointed out by Pearl (1996)29. This rarefied environment, as we have seen, coupled with the unnatural nature of SI itself, whereby interpreters both are and are not there, tucked away in booths that are themselves often totally or partially hidden from direct view, and speaking to large and faceless audiences who, in turn, do not know or care about them, explains why many and crucial theoretical insights from simultaneous interpreters have tended to neglect completely the psychological and cultural factors of communication. Different kinds of international organisations International organisations can be divided along different criteria. The first to come to mind is the degree of internationalism or the number of members, whereby the United Nations would top the list. Another one is the level of conference activities, as measured in interpreter days used per unit of time, and there the winners are the European Commission and Parliament. A third criterion would be the political/non-political demarcation line, with the UN and NATO at one extreme and the ARTE channel at the other. A forth one - the degree of technical specialisation, with the International Telecommunications Union or the International Civil Aviation Organisation huddling on one side, and the European Court of Human Rights on the other. Yet another would be the homogeneity of power among participants, with the International Labour Office as the sole UN system organisation whose membership is statutorily divided along class lines, and the International Tribunals for Crimes un the Former Yugoslavia or Rwanda as the most obvious cases of power inequality between different layers of participants, from the Judges above to the defendants below. Another division would be between international public organisations (most of them), and not so public or outright private ones, such as the Socialist International or the ARTE channel. Still another set of pigeonholes would separate global international organisations from regional ones, such as the European Institutions or the UN’s own Regional Economic Commissions, or organisations structured around special economic interests (the International Coffee and Cocoa Organisations, grouping both buyers and sellers, or the Organisation of Petrol Exporting Countries, voicing the interests of sellers alone), or political and/or religious ideology (the Socialist International, the Islamic Conference), or an international treaty (the Organisation for the 29

The most revealing is the fact that, all too often, meetings go on beyond scheduled time without interpretation and, most scarily, without delegates seeming to care - not even the anglophobic French! 194

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Prohibition of Chemical Weapons and the Comprehensive Test Ban Organisation, which treaties are open in membership and are basically offshoots of the UN, or the Antarctic Treaty Organisation, which has very strict access rules). From the standpoint of conference interpreting, the most visible divide, as well as most pertinent to many -but by far not all- relevant effects, would separate: 1) bilingual organisations, such as NATO, the Franco-German ARTE channel, the African and Inter-American Development Banks, the International Court of Justice and a few others, 2) trilingual, such as the Organisation of American States or the United Nations Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean, 3) multilingual, such as the United Nations proper and most of its specialised agencies, the Organisation for Cooperation and Development in Europe, the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe and some others, and 4) omnilingual such as the European Commission and Parliament, where every country is allowed to speak and listen to her own official language - at least in theory. The degree of plurilingualism is decisive in that the multiplication of languages necessitates both a mathematical increase in the number of interpreters and booths per meeting and an exponential one of language combinations, coupled with a consequently decreasing supply in the market. Since what will govern a practitioner’s market opportunities is, after all, his language combination rather than his specialised knowledge or rhetorical preferences or abilities, most interpreters will work for most organisations requiring their combinations, regardless of how these organisations can be characterised along other criteria. Thus, the Arabic interpreters who serviced the Scottish Court judging the Libyan defendants in the Lockerbie case, are the same ones who are otherwise recruited by the United Nations, the Islamic Conference, the Inter-Parliamentary Union, the International Committee of the Red Cross, OPEC, or the Non-Aligned Movement. The multilingual interpreter - an inevitable shift from quality to quantity If knowledge of a language, even on a passive level, is inseparable from deep familiarity with, or even immersion in, the relevant culture, its cuisine and literature, its sports and history, then it stands to reason that there is a limit to the number of passive languages an interpreter can be competent to work from in a broad array of professional contexts. The AIIC (International Association of Conference Interpreters) yearbook features very few practitioners with more than three, and fewer still with more than four passive languages - i.e. more than five in all! This, however, is the bare minimum required to cover the now fifteen or so passive tongues that any single booth must interpret from at a European Commission meeting with all official languages (and that with at least three interpreters, it being literally impossible to find enough pairs who can cover ten different languages between them). An enlarged Union would theoretically embrace anywhere between twenty and twenty-five languages or more. In the European context, with its imminently unmanageable linguistic demands, an © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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inevitable shift is thus already taking place from quality to quantity, at least for a time, and especially with respect to languages of limited diffusion. If an English interpreter with passive French and Spanish must elbow himself through stiff competition by dint of sheer ability to work better than most, his colleague with passive Polish, Greek and Hungarian will be walking the red carpet, even if his performance is not as brilliant. Indeed, if an interpreter must boast a hyper-solid knowledge of passive English, French or German, the demands on passive Maltese, Portuguese or Slovenian cannot be but less strict. As a matter of fact, the EU spends considerable amounts of money crash-training their interpreters in these and other languages of limited diffusion - an unthinkable thing in the case of English or French. Also, at least initially, most interpreters out of these newly international languages will be working into their B not only from their A, but also from several C languages. Whatever a practitioner’s competence in absolute terms, interpretation from C into B (which is excluded in two-way booths such as the Chinese or Arabic at the UN) is never the best option when it comes to quality. Added to this inevitable fact will be the equally unavoidable system of multiple relay. As Pearl (1995) so rightly points out, SI is both finite and fallible, and these demands cannot but put its limitations to the utmost test. That being said, in all probability the kinds of contexts in which multilingual interpreters will have to work from their weakest languages will not exceed their ability. After all, SI is but a specific service for specific ad hoc purposes. Provided the purposes do not exceed the practitioners’ ability, the system ought to work reasonably well most of the time. One wonders what place would there be now for those legendary consecutivists at the League of Nations. Who would really choose their shining oratory despite their meagre bilingualism? The inevitable bane of relay interpreting In many multilingual contexts, it is literally impossible to have all booths cover all needed language combinations. It was standard practice in the former USSR to use the Russian booth as the “focal” booth, interpreting from every language spoken in the room and with the rest of the booths (all manned by Russian interpreters going into their B language) relaying from it. In such cases, relay is taken for granted and users consequently adapt their expectations. Relay can be a problem, however, in less radical contexts. At the UN, as a case in point, Arabic and Chinese interpreters ensure interpretation both into their mother tongue and out of it, mostly into English or French. This means that interpretation into all the other languages is relayed from either English or French. Also, Russian and, to a lesser extent, Spanish, is more or less systematically relayed from English or French into the other languages. Needless to point out, besides the greater risk of inaccuracies or mistakes inherent to relayed interpreting this involves a lag between original and interpretation into some, rather than all, languages. This latter fact can be most bothersome when the language relayed from is that of a meeting’s Chairman, 196

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but it can be outright irritating when the speaker (or a member of his delegation) purports to follow, say, the English interpreter without realising that the latter is interpreting from an intermediate booth. There are two UN delegations that are notorious for mistrusting interpreters, assuming that only interpretation into English counts, and expecting a literal interpretation, with all the relevant cognates, whether they make idiomatic sense of not. As I was writing this chapter the following incident occurred at the Committee on the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space: Due to an unexpected casualty in our bony ranks, there was no Russian coverage in the all-important, strategic and basically idle English booth. The Russian delegate read an important position paper (which he had neglected to let the interpreters have) while a colleague in the delegation listened intently to the English booth, which was relaying from either French or Spanish (the two booths providing direct interpretation from Russian). The delegate read a fragment of a clause and stopped. Since interpreters into Romance languages normally require more than the dawning of a clause to put together an independently verbalisable unit of sense, they waited for it to be completed. The English interpreter had, therefore, nothing to interpret. But the speaker, having been warned by his colleague that no English interpretation was forthcoming, assumed that the interpreter had not understood, so he repeated his half clause, whereupon the French and Spanish interpreters repeated their silence, and the English interpreter his. Everybody became nervous, not least the interpreters and, above all, the poor English colleague, who had no way of knowing what was going on and, to make things worse, had his neck on the line30. This, of course, proves yet again how essential trust in the mediator is for mediated communication to proceed smoothly; and it also proves that such trust will not necessarily be forthcoming on its own: For starters it has to be deserved, then it has to be earned, and barring that it must be secured - if not from recalcitrant speakers, then from the originator and everybody else. In other words, the one to 30

After the meeting, the three interpreters involved met to discuss the incident and what to do if it should happen again. The English colleague asked the other two to be as literal as possible and to tailgate the speaker at all times, even if this meant a less than idiomatic verbalisation. I begged to disagree: quality is never to be compromised for the sake of a speaker’s ignorant whim. The thing to do was to explain the situation to all users and speakers and let them know in no uncertain terms that we cannot provide a decent service unless certain basic conditions are in place. My instructions were henceforward for the English interpreter so say over the microphone “The interpreter is relaying from another booth. If the speaker speaks normally, my colleague will give me a normal interpretation that I can then normally reinterpret into English. Stopping at every clause is self-defeating. Can the speaker please proceed with his speech: We have done relayed interpretation into and from all languages, including this one, before and there is no reason to assume that we will not be able to this time around.” This, I submit, is the way to enhance the profession and its practitioners’ status: educating our clients, rather than meekly bowing to their uneducated notions of our task and compromising quality into the bargain. It is a typical case in which, I submit, loyalty to the profession must prevail over loyalty to the speaker, our interlocutors and our client. © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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be isolated is not the interpreter but the recalcitrant speaker. Such responsibility lies primarily on practitioners themselves - nobody else is going to do it for them. As can be seen, the problem lies in the fact that there are several overlapping acts of speech with different participants: each booth with its own interlocutors plus, in the case of the English booth, one basic act whose interlocutors are the rest of the audience and another whose interlocutor is the Russian delegate who is monitoring the interpretation: Everybody else in the room is listening to the interpreter qua speaker, but the Russian aide is listening to him qua servant, not in order to learn what the speaker is saying, but to verify whether the interpretation matches whatever idea this monitor may have of what this specific interpretation of this specific speech ought to be, including, as I was saying, certain English words that he expects the interpreter to use, regardless of whether the ones actually chosen by the interpreter are as adequate or, more often than not, much more so. SI for the media Interlingual intercultural mediation is always confronted with sundry epiphenomena that can limit and, at times, distort communication. In view of its neurophysiological component, I submit that SI falls within what Mayoral Asensio et al. (1988) call “constrained translation.” It is precisely this psychomotor constraint that lays bare the communicative essence of translation. SIM adds a further series of constraints both at the social and cognitive levels: When his job is exposed to an audience of millions, especially if his voice becomes, for all practical purposes, the linguistic part of a video’s soundtrack, the interpreter has a torrent of additional factors to attend to that cannot but add to the already complex set of competing efforts he is simultaneously engaged in. The interpreter’s success thus depends on a more efficient neurophysiological, psychological and motor support, and crucially on an adequate assessment of the communicative priorities: on what, under the circumstances, will be the optimum communicative vehicle (the right kind of verbalisation) required to help produce a relevantly identical LPC in the massive target audience. Such assessment clearly requires its own effort. This particular effort, as I pointed out, is the one that is more difficult to automate. Specific constraints The key question, as always, is the kind of LPI/LPC identity deemed relevant under the specific circumstances; i.e. what kind of functionality the interpreter’s speech act is to pursue. Whatever such functionality, the media can ill-afford less-than-optimum relevance for the public - except that, in many cases, such relevance cannot be directly controlled by them. Specifically, they cannot help a rambling, obscure or otherwise un-perspicuous speaker, save through post facto editing or, at best, well managed interviewing techniques. If the speaker is to be interpreted live, however, there is much that the media interpreter can himself do 198

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to increase relevance. I submit that this very ability ought to be his main distinctive asset vis-à-vis a conference interpreter. As already pointed out, the foremost constraint is immediate intelligibility of content and acceptability of form coupled to an optimum synchronisation with the relevant images (in other words, Fi must fit En). Next comes the consequent need to weed out any basically irrelevant or, worse, parasitic information. Information may be parasitic in two overlapping senses: details demanding a processing effort incommensurate with the cognitive effects that may be derived by a mass audience in real time, and details that force the interpreter into inordinate speed, therefore impeding both immediate intelligibility and acceptability by conspiring against overall quality of delivery (which in turn increases the processing effort on the part of the audience thereby reducing relevance). Thus, the interpreter’s FiCnEn, acquires particular autonomy with a view to optimising the addressees’ processing effort as a function of their presumed interest, ability and expectations. As a direct consequence of the other factors’ increased importance, then, equivalence at the morphosyntactic XnL and semantic SmH levels tends to weigh less heavily in SIM than in normal conference conditions, where, on the other hand, it can be assumed that all participants share the extralinguistic hermeneutic package and social setting. The media interpreter, in fact, is called upon a) to bridge a potentially much wider cultural and psychological disparity between the producer of the original speech act and the addressees of the new one, and b) consciously to adapt his own speech act so that it will be immediately intelligible and acceptable to a heterogeneous mass of addressees (often more so than the one originally intended, and certainly incommensurably more so than the audience targeted at a conference). There are, besides, several ad hoc constraints adding to stress. Among the most prominent we can list the following: a) Although in some instances the interpreter is in the same room as both the interviewee(s) and the interviewer(s), very often he is nowhere near either. b) Even when he is sharing in the sociocommunicative situation, the mediator’s task is totally asymmetric: whilst his performance into the interviewee’s language is private and addressed to a single interlocutor, his interpretation into the broadcast language is public, which faces him with as many as three potentially different sets of expectations and, therefore, norms: the interviewer’s, the originator’s, and the virtual audience’s. c) In most cases, the interpretation is taped and re-aired, which opens it to repeated mass consumption and scrutiny at an ever greater distance in time (in this respect, the media interpreter is akin to a translator mediating between an invisible author and an unknown readership) - to boot, by a massive audience of consumers who are totally ignorant of the workings of interpretation. d) If he is to be seen, then his “presence” must be impeccably unobtrusive. e) As Kurz and Bros-Bran (1996) point out, the media interpreter seldom can prepare for a specific job: he must be able to tackle any subject and any speaker at any time -

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he must boast many and comprehensive sets of K. f) The interpreter’s physical environment may be less than ideal (cramped space, poor isolation, unholy hours, etc.). g) Sound quality can be less than optimal: the speaker may be in an environment with lots of background noise, the microphone awkwardly placed (especially if several interviewers are vying with each other), etc. h) Many difficult speakers get to be interpreted over the media who would seldom make it to a conference room (the man in the street, semi-verbal adolescents, illiterate peasants, distraught victims, incoherent junkies, or, at the more sophisticated end of the spectrum, philosophers, scientists, artists, writers, actors, etc.). i) Elocution being much more decisive an intelligibility and acceptability factor than in non-media interpreting, it demands a larger amount of attention. j) It is normally essential that the interpreter complete his utterance not later than and at times even before the speaker (so that the value of n in tm+n becomes negative)31. k) Unlike his dialogic and conference colleagues, the media interpreter may address an absent speaker, and always a multitudinous and absent public. l) Crucially, the media interpreter takes on the heavy burden of incarnating the profession before the general public, who witness and judge it and its practitioners exclusively by him. All efforts tend, therefore, to become more demanding, whereby no alleviating trade-off is realistically possible among them - which cannot but tremendously add to stress. All this stress bears directly upon the interpreter’s conscious and, above all, unconscious motivation or resistance as either listener or speaker, filtering his specific mediating task. Unconscious resistance may well transpire paralinguistically or kinetically, i.e. it may “spill over” into C and/or E: the interpreter can sound or look nervous, ill at ease, irritated, despondent or bored. All of this he is normally keenly aware of which in turn cannot but complicate even further an already most stressful activity. Specific expectancy and professional norms As mentioned, the distinctiveness of SIM gives rise to specific expectancy norms. Whilst the expectancy norms in conference interpreting are basically those of the mediator’s users, in SIM the more immediate expectancy norms are those set by an elusive and in many cases naive initiator (perhaps the most curious of these norms is that many, mostly American, newscasters will not tolerate an interpreter who does not suffer from the relevant foreign accent). Yet, as I have tried to prove, our professional norm must be based on acceptability to the intended audience (N.B. “based on”). In any event, I could not agree more with Mack when he states that some media interpreters “still live on the other side of the (media) moon, where faithful transmission of meaning, even at the expense of form, for a co-operative audience is the supreme goal of interpreting” (2002:212). As I have argued above, in most cases, the speaker’s 31

At the AIIC meeting with Chief Interpreters in 1998, the Chief Interpreter of Arte complained about the inability evinced by most interpreters in this respect. 200

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thick accent, inordinate speed, or gruesome inarticulateness (all detracting from relevance) ought not to stand in the way of the interpreter’s clarity: He must strive come what may to adapt his own verbalisation for maximum intelligibility by the presumed audience. Thus, the constant tug-of-war between expectancy and professional norms becomes, if anything, more intense. This may add yet another layer of stress: that of the uneasy relationship between the piper and whoever pays him and calls the wrong tune, or, at best, calls it to be played the wrong communicative way. Media interpreting: a new, particularly sophisticated specialisation Unlike i conference colleagues, then, the media interpreter has to be in a position to tackle any subject and any speaker, any dialect, any sociolect and any idiolect, at any time. Except that his competence must go far beyond that, since, ideally, he is expected to be a consummate mediator, with the psycho-motor reflexes of the conference interpreter, the cultural sensitivity of the community interpreter, the analytical keenness and background knowledge of the journalist, and the rhetorical prowess of the seasoned communicator. Indeed, indispensable as the skills and resilience normally required at an international conference are, they are not nearly enough; so much so that most conference interpreters that I know, at least in the US, charge considerably more when called upon to work for the media. As Russo points out: “The TV viewers’ and radio listeners’ expectations are so high that an interpreter ought to become a performer rather than just a linguistic/cultural mediator. Paramount importance is attached to factors such as: voice quality, a cohesive & coherent language and lively & self-confident performance, often to the detriment, if necessary of... fidelity or completeness...” (Russo 1995:54332).

Both understandably and unfortunately, interpretation schools do not provide specific training to this day, so that practitioners working for the media have to find their bearings on their haphazard isolated own. With the emergence of systematic multilingual broadcasts such as the Euronews or ARTE TV channels, the time has surely come to fill this gap. As we can see, in no other mediating activity do all the components of the model enter so evenly into play. Beginning with the pole of production: the star’s motivation, the politician’s pragmatic intention, meaning meant by so many interviewees and their different ability to verbalise it, the disjointed elocution by the victims of a tragedy. Ending in the pole of comprehension: the expectations and prejudices of a massive and heterogeneous audience - and most especially those of the media owners. At either end, besides, an infinite variety of precomprehension schemes and relevant knowledge that an interpreter must 32

See also Straniero-Sergio (1998), and Katan and Straniero-Sergio (2001), which came my way too late to incorporate their unexpected insights. © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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share with his interlocutors, and in the middle of the twain the contortions he must make in order to compatibilise those of the speakers with those of the audience - the need to produce a speech act that is optimally relevant, immediately intelligible, with a pleasant voice and professional enunciation and, lastly, his own motivation to come into the air in the most positive possible. Remote conference interpreting Somewhere between regular SI and SIM will eventually stand remote conference interpretation in its four basic “geographic” configurations: a) a speaker tele-interpreted to an audience co-present with the interpreter; b) a copresent speaker interpreted for an absent audience; c) an absent interpreter interpreting a speaker co-present with his audience; d) speaker, audience and interpreter scattered over the globe - all of this combined with the different communicative modalities characteristic of regular conference interpreting: monologue/dialogue, political/technical, informative/negotiating, formal/ informal, etc. A particularly important issue is whether remote interpreting is equally suited or at least suited enough to all the communicative modalities mentioned above. Common sense tells us that formal monologic plenary debates, with mostly prepared speeches and mostly non-functional kinesics, would lend themselves better than informal, unstructured negotiations, but the fact remains to be empirically proven33. To my mind, these new modalities of SI face the mediator with a complex array of hitherto unsuspected challenges. As was the case with the emergence of traditional conference SI half a century ago, the new constraints cannot but reveal different aspects of translation’s essence as a particular kind of mediated interlingual intercultural communication. But the consequences go well beyond, reaching into all nooks of professional practice, i.e. of translation as it actually exists. They deserve, therefore, most careful research in all their aspects, to wit, from the standpoints of: communication - all relevant aspects of masscommunication theory enter now more evidently into play; translation theory given the decisiveness of instant acceptability and intelligibility, new definitions of relevant identity, i.e. of noetic identity and formal adequacy, or at least new parameters to assess them, may be required; neurophysiology - the way in which the new conditions affect the interpreter’s mental and physical health and resilience must be determined; pedagogy - the necessary additions to interpretation curricula must be contemplated; professional practice - the new forms of contradiction between professional and expectancy norms, and the special status of loyalty to speaker, audience, and, most particularly, client are to be weighed; deontology - in view of the interpreter’s new social and professional 33

Not quite, though: From 16 to 28 April 2000 a second remote interpretation experiment took place at the UN Headquarters in New York. Participating interpreters -myself among themunanimously agreed that in monological plenaries the sense of alienation and the physical absence from the room made work much more irritating and stressful. 202

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role and visibility; and, last but by no means least, economics - the levels of remuneration relative to non-media interpreting must be established. Sign and tactile language interpretation First, a clarification about “tactile” language: All I can tell you is what I learnt from a wonderful BBC documentary that I chanced to see as I was editing this chapter. It is the native or acquired language of people who are both deaf and blind and cannot therefore hear or see the linguistic units of oral and sign languages (Helen Keller was the first tactile speaker we know of). Apparently, the brain centres and/or regions that are normally used to decode oral and sign language are reprogrammed, as it were, to process tactile speech stimuli. Interestingly, pragmatic meaning is conveyed through the intensity, crispness and speed of the tactile pressure on the fingers and palms of the interlocutor. Another crucial factor distinguishing this kind of language from all others is that each interlocutor requires his own speaker or mediator: the nature of the linguistic stimulus allows only for strictly one-to-one dialogue. I am no specialist in non-oral languages, so I will limit myself to pointing out the importance of this newly recognised form of professional mediation whose practitioners -in the case of sign language- have of late greatly contributed to our understanding of the phenomena of communication, mediation and interpretation. The model can be applied almost as is to the specific features of the perceptual vehicle (either to Fo or to Fi or to both of them, as the case may be) and to a paralinguistic configuration that is no longer acoustic (but nevertheless different from pure kinetics). It is precisely in the passage from a language that cannot be seen to one that cannot be heard or one that can neither be heard nor seen, but simply felt as pressures on the nerve terminals in one’s hands, from one that is linear to another that is both spatial and linear, that all traditional models of equivalence, similarity and sundry formal resemblances between verbalisations come crashing down. If communication between the mute and deaf, between them and normal speakers, between the deaf and blind, and between them and normal speakers, and between the deaf and blind and the deaf and mute is at all possible, it is, no doubt, because despite the fact that the natural perceptions of the world differ none other than in the most important sense for the perception of speech, we can all achieve a sufficient degree of speech perceptual identity to understand and cause to understand that we are speaking about the same world and in the same world. Also, whatever the cognitive differences in the two modes of perception and/or mental processing of the linguistic signs, the fact remains that this kind of communication proves that first-degree, natural perception and the production and comprehension of LPs a social perception are different things. Translation theory (and, therefore, practice) cannot advance if we do not leave behind once and for all the obsolete notion that communication is simply an exchange of linguistic signs and that translation is nothing but the substitution of a series of © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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linguistic signs with another. Also, whatever the limitations, the nonintelligibility or “ineffability” of specific cognitive or pragmatic elements or nuances in any of such languages is bound to be a perceptual limitation, which, if so, will corroborate the basic tenet of García Landa’s conception: to speak is to produce speech perceptions in social situations governed by an exponential field. No theory of speech -much less of translation- that is incapable of explaining these types of communication, statistically marginal, granted, but humanly no less important than any other, has the right to call itself general. The Australian model - the sensible way of the future Mikkelson (2000:19) reports that Australia, rather than focussing on specific categories (i.e. social types and cognitive modes) of interpreting has a multitiered accreditation system in which practitioners are rated at four different levels: 1) Paraprofessional Interpreter, 2) Interpreter, 3) Conference Interpreter and 4) Conference Interpreter (Senior). In other words, court interpreters are not automatically regarded as inferior to conference interpreters, as is the case in many countries. She goes on to quote Ozolins, according to whom, the designers of the accreditation system wanted to avoid: “an exclusive demarcation line between the previously established profession of conference interpreters and technical translators for international needs, on the one hand, and the newer emerging groups of interpreters and translators for local needs on the other; rather, they saw all these practitioners as essentially one profession with differences of specialities and levels as in other professions34.”

Amen to that! And to all other sub-specialisations in the profession, including, most notably, sign-language interpreters who, themselves, can work dialogically, consecutively or simultaneously, at the Courts, at a conference, in TV or between patient and physician. I hope my colleagues at AIIC do not get me wrong: I don’t mean to demean us, but I do mean to uphold the entire profession with its obvious different levels of competence and specialisation. Paraprofessional interpreters play as crucial a role as paramedics, and this role should be socially, academically and financially recognised accordingly - for this they should obviously be trained by professional mediators (as nurses are taught by physicians). Professional interpreters too come in many levels of training and specialisation, as do lawyers or physicians, and there is no objective basis or social reason to divide the profession otherwise. From the standpoint of the theory and model I am propounding here, the Australian model is the first 34

As reported by Mikkelson, candidates for Level 2, Interpreter, are tested in CI only, whereas candidates for the higher levels are tested also in SI. Also, it is recommended although (alas!) not required by law, that court proceedings be interpreter by practitioners at the third level or above. 204

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important right step in the right direction: I cannot wait to rub elbows with my colleagues from all over the world and all over the professional spectrum in unified professional organisations at the national and, why not?, international level. AIIC, of course, would still have its unique status as the international association of international professionals, and I see no contradiction in its members belonging also to the relevant national associations of mediators - as tends to be the case anyway. The gaping holes in interpreter training As Mikkelson (2000), among others, points out, legal, community and other kinds of non-conference interpreting (including SI for the media) are simply not taught at most schools of interpretation. As a matter of fact, little other than conference interpretation is taught - or purported to be taught. This, to my mind, is a social waste: schools of translation and interpretation should be fully fledged schools of interlingual mediation, with different branches, specialisations and academic levels of qualification. This idea is elbowing its way laboriously into the mind of many practitioners and teachers. The need for a postgraduate Master in Conference Interpreting is, again, a right step in the right direction, if surprise!- limited to hallowed simultaneous conference interpreting. I realise my vision may strike many as utopian if not altogether misguided. But I see it coming, and so do, I think, practitioners and teachers of the less prestigious brands of mediation. The day will come, I fervently hope, when only academically qualified and certified professionals, duly accredited by their own peers, will be legally able to mediate at any but the most inconsequential events, and certainly at institutional settings such as the courts, international organisations and any gathering requiring a high level of competence and where error or less than adequate skills entail serious social consequences - I dream of the day when mediators will be legally liable for their professional practice and ethical behaviour... as everybody else who practices a liberal profession in today’s global world - no more, no less. Post Scriptum: A paradigmatic case May I simply quote verbatim message 44016, dated 7 August 2002, by Argentine mediator Susana Fij to the El Lenguaraz forum ([email protected]): “Me llamaron como intérprete de un juzgado criminal, porque habían detenido a un tipo de Camerún. En total, fui cuatro veces. En cada una de ellas no pude dejar de pensar “menos mal que no es mi primer preso, si no, me internan”. Y esto, tanto por lo que se refiere a lo emocional, como a la experiencia. Lo emocional no es necesario explicarlo, con el tiempo te vas curtiendo pero, por suerte, NO insensibilizando (si me sucediera algún día, cambiaría de profesión). Pero, en cuanto a la experiencia, creo que fue de lo más ilustrativa: La primera vez porque, dado el nivel cultural del tipo, lo que yo le decía era el triple o más de lo que decía el defensor oficial, ya que traté de explicarle todo con ejemplos © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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y con lo que fuere, con tal que entendiera lo que le estaba diciendo. La segunda, porque me fui a años luz de los aspectos puramente lingüísticos como, por ejemplo, tomar la iniciativa de llamar a informaciones desde el juzgado para averiguar si existía el cobro revertido con su país, o prestar mucha atención al tono de mi voz frente a los desbordes de violencia del tipo, sabiendo que, de esa forma, acercaba a todos a lograr el objetivo buscado. La tercera, porque me extralimité (a sabiendas) y tuve un diálogo directo con él, en el cual [le dije de todo] porque pretendía haber dicho que quería un abogado particular, no un defensor oficial. Le recordé, por las mías, todo lo que le había explicado la primera vez. En este caso, pensé que si me limitaba a oficiar de maquinita traductora, no sólo iba a ser architedioso sino que, también, se iba a perder la naturalidad de la situación. También por las mías le pregunté varias veces seguidas si iba a firmar o no el acta (era obvio que no lo iba a hacer), pero quería escuchar de sus labios NETAMENTE la palabra “no”, para que no dijera, después, que él no se había negado. Le comenté al Secretario esto último, y me felicitó. Y en la última -muy cortita- sólo tenía que comunicarle una resolución del juez. Todos estaban convencidos de que no iba a firmar. El Secretario estaba podrido, quería terminar lo antes posible y ya estaba buscando dos testigos, pero yo me emperré en explicarle lo más dulcemente posible las consecuencias de su decisión de firmar o no (que no le traía consecuencias), que no me viera como su enemiga y, finalmente, ¡firmó! Conclusión: todavía no sé si en el juzgado se quedaron conformes o si piensan que soy una loca que dice lo que se le canta, pero yo me quedé muy satisfecha de haber puesto lo mejor de mí, agregándole a lo lingüístico la idea fija de la COMUNICACIÓN EFECTIVA a través de la sicología que una puede manejar intuitivamente o de cualquier elemento que esté al alcance de la mano, mejor dicho: de la boca.” [I was recruited as an interpreter by a criminal court because they had arrested a guy from Cameroon. In all I had to go four times, and each of them I could not stop thinking “thank God it is not my first detainee, otherwise I’d have to be institutionalised.” This, both emotionally and experientially. The emotive part requires no explanation; in time you become inured but, thank God, not insensitive (if it should ever happen to me, I’d choose another profession). As for the experience, however, I think it was most illustrative. First, because, in view of the guy’s level of education, what I said to him was three or more times more than what the court-appointed counsellor did, since I had to explain everything with examples and whatnot so that he could understand what I was saying to him. Second, because I departed light years from the purely linguistic aspects, such as taking the initiative to call information from the court to find out whether reverse charges calls were possible to his country, or paying close attention to the tone of my own voice whenever he went violently over the board, knowing that, in that way, I brought everybody closer to the mutual objective. Third, because I (knowingly) crossed the limits and had a direct dialogue with him in which I let him have it because he alleged that he wanted a private lawyer, not a court-appointed one. I reminded him, on my own, of all that I had explained to him the first time. In this instance, I thought that if I limited myself to play the role of a translating machine not only would it have been unbearably tedious, but, also, the naturalness of the situation would be lost. Also on my own, I asked him repeatedly if whether he was going to sign the record or not (it was obvious that he was not), but I wanted to hear him ACTUALLY say “no”, so that he could not later allege that he had not refused. 206

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I told this to the registrar and he congratulated me. The last time -a very short hearing- I only had to communicate to him a decision by the judge. Everybody was sure that he was not going to sign. The Registrar was fed up; he wanted to wrap it up as soon as possible and was already looking for two witnesses, but I stuck to explaining to him as sweetly as I could the consequences of his decision to sign or not (which had no consequences for him), that he should not see me as his enemy and, at last, he did sign! Conclusion: I still don’t know if the people at the court were happy or if they think I’m a nutter who says whatever she well damn pleases, but I left most happy to have given my best, adding to the linguistic the idée fixe of EFFECTIVE COMMUNICATION through the psychology that one can intuitively apply or through any other element at hand, or, rather, at mouth”.]

One day -soon, I hope- mediators will actually learn these things at school rather than at random.

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CHAPTER V WRITTEN MEDIATION “Now that it is translated and finished, everybody can read and criticise it. One now runs one’s eyes more than three or four pages and does not stumble once - without realising what boulders and clods had once lain there where one goes along as over a smoothly-planed board. We had to sweat and toil there before we got those boulders and clods out of the way, so that one could go along so easily. The ploughing goes well when the field is cleared.” Martin Luther, Sendbrief vom Dolmetschen (translated by Reiss (2000)).

An unnatural act As I pointed out, written mediation is, in fact, the most unnatural. It is indeed paradoxical that whenever we think of translation at the most abstract it is written translation that serves as a model: oral translation is the “marked” concept. That we, textified mortals, cannot see it, that we even think that the written word is the translatological and communicative truth and that orality is but a fleeting if interesting epiphenomenon, has led to the greatest problem besetting us. Only if we see the “text” as the inert circumstantial evidence of a living act of speech, an act that was born as the speaker wrote, that became immediately frozen in time and will culminate many times in as many acts of reading as await it, an act that, for starters, is subject to the same conditions as any other speech act - only then can we understand, approach and practise translation effectively. Indeed, translation is successful only insofar as it works effectively as communication - i.e. as it is functional for its reader, whilst practice has historically been adequate insofar as translators have understood -if mostly on the basis of serendipity and intuition- that such is indeed the case. Successful literary translation provides living empirical proof: Unless it actually “works” as literature, i.e. unless it actually works as literary speech, and regardless of its fidelity, translation fails to make a lasting imprint in any target literature. On the other hand, whatever its philological authenticity and all manner of fidelity marks, if translation does not “work” as literary speech, it subsists, if at all, as an object of curiosity or even devotion to the initiates - as I shall try and show in the last chapter. Before proceeding to the relevant model, I will make two short stopovers. The problem of style Bakhtin (1978:268 and foll.) distinguishes first (simple) and second (complex) discourse genres. The former are constituted within spontaneous verbal exchanges whilst the latter -novels, dramas, scientific and ideological discourseare relatively more evolved, having absorbed the first ones. The distinction is © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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theoretically crucial: utterances must be elucidated and defined by an analysis of these two genres - only thus can we have a clear idea of their nature and, most particularly, of the correlation between language, ideologies and world visions. To ignore the nature of an utterance and the genre peculiarities marking the variety of discourse in any specific domain leads to formalism and weakens the link between language and life. This affects, first and foremost, style. Style is organically linked to an utterance and to the typical forms of utterances, i.e. of discourse genres. The sheer selection by a speaker of a specific grammatical form is already a stylistic act. An utterance is individual, by virtue of which it can reflect the individuality of the speaker (or writer) - an utterance has, therefore, an individual style. But -and this is essential to translation and mediation- all genres are not equally apt to reflect an individuality in the language of an utterance; all are not equally propitious to individual style. The most propitious ones, of course, are those akin to literature. In most genres, however, individual style is not a part of the utterance’s design, does not serve exclusively its purposes and becomes an epiphenomenon, a supplementary feature. The indissoluble, organic link between style and genre shows more clearly in the cases of functional style, which is but the style specific to a specific activity domain: Each domain has its genres, adequate to its specificity, and specific styles to match. Wherever there is style - there is genre. Although style is a most visible component of primary genres, in oral mediation it is one of the things that is more negotiable - in most cases there is simply no time to “do justice” -let alone “imitate”- a speaker’s style - nor does the speaker himself have the time spontaneously to work on it. This is the reason why the Parisians and García Landa, who develop their concepts on the empirical basis of consecutive and simultaneous interpretation, underestimate the importance of linguistic form: Indeed, except in its broadest sense, style tends to be practically irrelevant for most kinds of oral communication, whether mediated or not. In written texts, on the other hand, style can, in principle, be a) rehearsed, and b) imitated. But, as Bakhtin warns us, its functionality varies from genre to genre. The dialogic nature of texts Second genres, in most cases, take for granted a delayed-action responsive active comprehension. “La compréhension réponsive active n’est rien d’autre que le stade initial, préparatoire à une réponse (quelle que soit la forme de sa réalisation). Un locuteur postule une telle compréhension réponsive active : ce qu’il attend, ce n’est pas une compréhension passive qui, pour ainsi dire, ne ferait que dupliquer sa pensée dans l’esprit d’un autre, ce qu’il attend, c’est une réponse, un accord, une adhésion, une objection, une exécution, etc. La variété des genres du discours présuppose la variété des visées intentionnelles de celui qui parle ou écrit.” (Bakhtin 1978: 275.)

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[Active responsive comprehension is nothing but the initial, preparatory stage to a response (whatever its form). A speaker posits such an active responsive comprehension: what he expects is not a passive comprehension that, as it were, would but duplicate his thought in the other’s mind1; what he expects is a reaction, an agreement, an adhesion, an objection, an execution, etc. The variety of discourse genres presupposes the variety of intentional designs of the speaker or writer.]

Second genres are no less dialogical than first genres, except that the obvious finitude of their utterances seems to isolate written texts from the vast chain of which they are but a link (whence the accrued relevance of linguistic form, including, most notably, style). Written utterances are always units of a verbal exchange - they too aim at an interlocutor’s active responsive comprehension, even if he is an unknown, abstract addressee. In all cases, the writer will take into account his interlocutor and his perceptiveness; in some, the latter’s influence on the utterance’s structure is reduced to the scope of his specialised knowledge, whilst in others his reaction will be assessed in a more pluridimensional way. If we lose sight of this fundamental fact of human communication, if we neglect a speaker’s or writer’s relationship to his interlocutor and to the latter’s own utterances, we cannot understand genre, style, or discourse - consequently, we cannot translate effectively. The model of written mediation As in García Landa’s model of the written text, speech production and comprehension are separated in time and space. In the first half of the speech act, the comprehension pole is absent: The speaker speaks, as it were, into the vacuum, becoming his own lonely comprehender. In the second half, it is the production pole that is absent: The reader is faced with a naked FoCmEm that he strives to interpret in the new situation as an intentional act - as a clue to meaning meant (to boot, prosody and register he must normally infer). In his reading act DLo, a translator is faced with the silent FoCmEm, strives to evoke an LPCo relevantly identical to the LPIo, is affected by it, and then, on the basis of his assessment of relevance for the new interlocutor(s) -which may include or be the originator of the translation- and guessing at his reader’s hermeneutic ability, interests and sensitivity, turns it into his LPIi and verbalises it as it were “into the vacuum” by means of a new act of writing DTi: [Fo(XmL,SmH)CmEm]GPMVHtm  UZ > LPCoK  Aa [] -------------------------------DTo-----------------------------[] WZ > Yy > LPIiK  [Fi(XnL,SnH,VnR,JnQ)CnEn]GPMVHtm+n ------------------------------------DTi---------------------------------

1

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but he will still be aiming at a possibly unverifiable relevant identity between LPIo and LPCi. To achieve it, he has nothing save his professionally developed hermeneutic package, acumen, sensitivity and common sense. Such identity, of course, is hardest to verify when reading -let alone translating- literary or philosophical works, especially when the author is not available. This is not a shortcoming of theory, but an inescapable empirical fact that theory both incorporates and explains. The model applied Translation as passive mediation . Instrumental translation If, being the most typical and quintessential mode, dialogue interpreting offers the best direct window on oral mediation, it is the translation of everyday pedestrian, pragmatic, purely instrumental texts that will provide the best direct view of written mediation. In such texts noetic content is for all practical purposes all that matters: no further contextual effects are sought by either speaker or addressee than comprehension itself (which, of course, can never strictly be true), whereby the speaker’s individual style is mostly or totally irrelevant. I shall start, then, by this kind of texts that lend themselves more easily to García Landa’s prototypical model. Let me stress that, for the nonce, and following skopostheorie, what interests me is not so much the instrumentality of the original text, but that of its translation, since it is the latter that determines all strategic and tactical options. As a working definition, let me use the term instrumental translation (or, for that matter, interpretation) to refer to those Dis that are to be judged exclusively with respect to their functionality in the target culture, i.e. that are not to be judged on the basis of the surface similarity between the respective Fs: For instance the public signs “No smoking,” “Prohibido fumar,” [smoking prohibited] “Défense de fumer,” [prohibition to smoke] and “Zdjes nje kúrjat,” [here one does not smoke], typical in English, Spanish, French, and Russian, are instrumentally identical despite the obvious syntactic and semantic differences, so that translating the sign (n. b. the sign, not the phrase) “Prohibido fumar” as “No smoking” is to translate homofunctionally. Conversely, rendering “Zdjes ne kúrjat” as “Here one does not smoke” is not to translate homofunctionally (the translated text does not function as a public sign in the target culture) - even though it may be advisable, for instance, for my purposes here (i.e. its instrumentality lies in its being a token of a Russian sign - as opposed to a sign in Russian). To be more specific, instrumental texts are basically means for the transmission of propositional content, and their homoscopic and homofunctional translation -which is what is normally required- consists in the reverbalisation of the LPIo as LPIi without reference to the felicities or infelicities of Fo. In relevance theoretical terms, this kind of translation would be described as second-degree interlingual descriptive, rather than interpretive, use: The original 212

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and translated texts (LPIoFo and LPIiFi) would be parallel and independent (not even equivalent or similar) descriptions of the same state of affairs. Thus, “No Smoking” would not be considered a translation of “Prohibido fumar” anymore than “Prohibido fumar” would be considered a translation of “No Smoking.” More crucially, parallel versions of, say, owner’s manuals for different kinds of appliances, whether or not they have been arrived at on the basis of pre-extant “originals,” would not be considered translations at all. If we are to be coherent, though, then neither would the parallel versions of international treaties - despite the obvious fact that they are arrived at by an imbricate process of translation and back-translation between all languages. We can see the unnecessary problem that this poses to a practising translator, who will have to produce such translations anyway, and most of the time at that. Be that as it may, these texts often lend themselves admirably to García Landa’s model. The translator “isolates” the LPI on the basis of his comprehension, prompted by his processing of Fo, and then proceeds to reverbalise it taking stock of the new situation: He is an uncommitted, impartial, “transparent” interlocutor to the speaker and speaker to his new interlocutor(s). Uncommitted, impartial and transparent... but not slavish: The translator must find an apt verbalisation for the same LPI, and in view of the new situational parameters, this calls for great heuristic ability and independence. As a matter of fact, in García Landa’s model, the translator becomes a fully fledged independent speaker, who is nevertheless bound to repeat what the original speaker has said so that it will be understood by the new interlocutors in the new language and situation. As we have seen, this is exactly what consecutive interpreters are forced to do, whatever their conscious or unconscious theoretical outlook (or that of their clients), since the inordinate tm+n lapse prevents them altogether from remembering Fo: In consecutive interpreting, transcoding Fo into Fi is simply impossible. A translator can do whatever he wishes or is able to, but he will have succeeded or failed insofar as he has or has not been able to ensure LPIo/LPCi identity. Indeed, at multilingual conferences, one can listen to a team of ten or twenty or more interpreters, all of them translating into and from different languages with different degrees of hermeneutic and heuristic ability, styles, and even concepts of the best way to perform their task, yet, insofar as all of them are managing LPIo/LPCi identity relevantly enough, communication proceeds smoothly. This is all that all these interpreters must do, and, therefore, all that their different notions of the task in hand and actual performance must share. As we shall soon see, the same goes for translation. It makes little sense to argue the theoretical point: actual practice confirms it empirically every day at hundreds of meetings at dozens of international organisations the world over, and, if they were surveyed, millions of users of millions of appliances could attest to it, pace critics of translations of Finnegan’s Wake.

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So, without further theoretical ado, let me proceed to several authentic examples of second-genre texts - i.e. of public (as opposed to private2) written texts, the kinds that professional translators normally are called upon to translate. Let me start by tackling a strictly pragmatic, informative text: two paragraphs of a report on biodiversity published by the United Nations Environment Programme: 51. Biological diversity (or biodiversity) encompasses all species of plants, animals, and micro-organisms and the ecosystems and ecological processes of which they are parts. It is usually considered at three different levels: genetic diversity, species diversity, and ecosystem diversity. Genetic diversity is the sum total of genetic information, contained in the genes of individual plants, animals, and micro-organisms that inhabit the Earth. Species diversity refers to the variety of living organisms on Earth. Ecosystem diversity relates to the variety of habitats, biotic communities, and ecological processes in the biosphere, as well as the tremendous diversity within ecosystems in terms of habitat differences and the variety of ecological processes. 52. No one knows the number of species on Earth, even to the nearest order of magnitude. Estimates vary from 5 to 80 million species or more. Only about 1.4 million of these living species have been briefly described. Of these about 750,000 are insects, 41,000 are vertebrates and 250,000 are plants; the remainder consists of a complex array of invertebrates, fungi, algae and other micro-organism. [174 words]

We shall pose the basic questions: Why has this text been written and published at all? In order to inform, within a certain social situation, about the subject matter. Who are its intended addressees? Civil servants at relevant administrative echelons in different countries. How well does it achieve its function? Awkwardly: it is confusing, redundant and patronising, probably written by a non-native speaker (a common occurrence at the UN). Why is it to be translated? In order to widen its accessibility. A homoscopic, homofunctional translation is therefore called for. Can decisive changes in the hermeneutic package be reasonably expected among the readers, say, of the Spanish translation? Hardly. What kind of strategy is to be applied in translating? The same as in the original writing, except that a professional mediator can solve the tactical problems much more aptly and, in general, achieve greater relevance. This text, then, lends itself most obviously to prototypical translation. The mediating hand is needed simply to remedy the involuntary ineptness of Fo, not only as a token of bad English, but, more crucially, as an awkward, far from optimally relevant verbalisation of an LPI: These paragraphs are hopelessly repetitive and irritatingly over explicit, violating nearly all of the Gricean 2

The difference is fundamental: private texts, say a love letter, address a single known addressee and have his particular response in mind. Needless to point out, when translated “for the public,” private texts cease to be private. 214

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maxims. Among other things, in the first one the word “diversity” is repeated eight times, both references to the “Earth” are unnecessary; “refers” and “relates” are used incorrectly as synonyms of “encompasses”; the first sentence in paragraph 52 is clumsy; while “other” in the last line is clearly out of place. To boot, these paragraphs read more like a textbook for young students than a report addressed to experts and government officials. All of this produces an unwanted effect of irritation which taxes the reader’s patience and, with it, his willingness to cooperate - i.e. to understand. Intention is thus torpedoed by rhetorical ineptness to the detriment of function and effect. For the sake of communicative success (pursued, we can trust, by author, originator and readers alike), translations of such texts ought, in principle, to be concise, clear and idiomatic - as, indeed, ought to be the originals themselves. The authors of this type of documents are often very poor writers, but the professional mediator cannot plead the layman’s ineptness as his own excuse. In this specific case, a translator has the deontological duty to make his Fi more adequate to meaning originally meant, to the LPIo. The published Spanish version read as follows: 51. La diversidad biológica abarca todas las especies de plantas, animales y microorganismos, así como los ecosistemas y los procesos ecológicos de que forman parte. Normalmente se estudia a tres niveles distintos, a saber: la diversidad genética, la diversidad de las especies y la diversidad de los ecosistemas. La diversidad genética es la suma de la información genética contenida en los genes de cada una de las plantas, los animales y los microorganismos que habitan la Tierra. La diversidad de las especies se refiere a la variedad de organismos vivos de la Tierra. La diversidad de los ecosistemas está relacionada con la variedad de los hábitats, las comunidades bióticas y los procesos ecológicos en la biosfera, así como con la enorme diversidad existente dentro de los ecosistemas en cuanto a las diferencias de hábitats y la variedad de procesos ecológicos. 52. No se conoce el número de especies que hay en la Tierra, ni siquiera en un orden de magnitud aproximado. Las estimaciones varían entre 5 y 80 millones de especies o más. Tan sólo alrededor de 1,4 millones de estas especies vivas se han descrito brevemente. De ellas, unas 750.000 corresponden a insectos, 41.000 a vertebrados y 250.000 a plantas; el resto corresponde a una compleja variedad de invertebrados, hongos, algas y otros microorganismos. [208 words] [51. Biological diversity embraces all species of plants, animals and microorganisms, as well as the ecosystems and ecological processes of which they are a part. Normally it is studied at three different levels, to wit: genetic diversity, species diversity and ecosystems diversity. Genetic diversity is the sum of the genetic information contained in the genes in each and every plant, animal and microorganism that inhabit Earth. Species diversity refers to the variety of organisms that are alive on Earth. Ecosystems diversity relates to the variety of habitats, biotic communities and ecological processes in the

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biosphere, as well as the differences existing within ecosystems as regards the differences in habitats and the variety of ecological processes. 52. Nobody knows the number of species that exist on Earth, even in an approximate order of magnitude. Estimates vary between 5 and 80 million species or more. Only around 1,4 million of these living species have been described briefly. Of them 750,000 relate to insects, 41,000 to vertebrates and 250,000 to plants; the rest relates to a complicated mixture of invertebrates, fungi, algae and other micro-organisms.] [177 words] 3

From the standpoint of García Landa’s model, this is, indeed a translation, since it allows for LPIo/LPCi identity. But how good is it? How close to or far from allowing for optimally relevant LPIo/LPCi identity, i.e. from enabling comprehension most efficiently? Are the facts clearly described? Hardly. Witness the simplicity of the propositional structure4. BIODIVERSITY - is all species + ecosystems / processes - plants - animals - micro-organisms - has three levels - genetic - species - ecosystem - genetic - is (all) the information in genes - vegetable - animal - micro-organisms - species - is (living) organisms

3

You may start noticing that back-translation from Spanish into English, which are, indeed, translations tout court, are systematically shorter -both typographically and phonetically- than the originals (there will not be a single case of translations into English not being shorter than their French, Italian, Russian or Spanish originals - and there will be close to a hundred before the book is over). 4

You may observe the uncanny resemblance between this “organigram” and the notes that a good consecutive interpreter might have taken (if with more symbols or abbreviations than actual words). This is exactly what I had in mind when I referred to the need for the consecutivist to mind structure rather than pay modular attention to propositional content and later, God willing, modularly recall it. 216

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- ecosystem - is (big) difference of - habitats - biotic communities - ecological processes + - processes within habitats

SPECIES NUMBER - is unknown - guessed at 5 - 80 million plus - known 1.4 million - 750,000 insects - 41,000 vertebrates - 250,000 plants - other [other] - invertebrate - fungi - algae - sundry microorganisms

Let us see: The first paragraph still boasts its eightfold “diversidad.” “Organismos vivos de la tierra” implies not all too weakly organisms that are alive rather than dead on Earth. If the implicature is “living” (i.e. “organic”) organisms as opposed to minerals, then no adjective is needed at all. Also, the syntactic connections in the last part are too stiff, reeking of legalese, unidiomatic (“así como,” “dentro de,” “en cuanto a”). In the second paragraph, the convoluted “ni siquiera en un orden de magnitud aproximado” takes inordinate effort to process: it can hardly be understood on line and requires rereading. The implicature of “tan solo 1,4 millones de estas especies vivas [i.e. not dead] has been described briefly” is that the rest has been described more exhaustively. The cancellation of this implicature also demands unnecessary effort. Also, what is so “complicated” [compleja] about the variety of invertebrates, fungi, algae and other microorganisms? Besides, the mention of “other” microorganisms is incoherent, since invertebrates, algae and fungi are not necessarily microscopic. To sum up, then, this text is as awkward as the original (except that its author cannot plead inadequate command of a foreign language): it is, therefore, most “faithful” (unduly interpretive rather than descriptive, according to relevance theory) - so much so that it serves my iconoclastic purpose to a tee! Which intended addressee needs this fidelity? What benefit is there for the UN in having a translation that so meticulously reproduces the ineptness of the original? What does the original author have to © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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gain from it? I suspect that the translator, possibly overworked and in a hurry, did not stop or stoop to pose the fundamental questions, or to answer them, or to translate consequently. Had he, he might have come up with something like this: 51. La diversidad biológica (o biodiversidad) comprende todas las especies de plantas, animales y microorganismos, como también los ecosistemas y procesos ecológicos en que se integran. Suele considerarse a tres niveles: genes, especies y ecosistemas. Por diversidad genética se entiende toda la información contenida en los genes de cada planta, animal y microorganismo; la de las especies abarca los organismos vivos; y la de los ecosistemas los distintos hábitats, comunidades bióticas y procesos ecológicos, así como las enormes diferencias de hábitats y procesos ecológicos que se dan en cada ecosistema. 52. La cantidad de especies que habitan nuestro planeta no se conoce ni aproximadamente. Los cálculos oscilan entre 5 y 80 millones o más, de las cuales se han catalogado apenas 1,4: unos 750.000 insectos, 41.000 vertebrados y 250.000 especies vegetales más un conjunto heterogéneo de invertebrados, hongos, algas y microorganismos diversos. [134 words] [51. Biological diversity (or biodiversity) embraces all species of plants, animals and micro-organisms, as well as the ecosystems and ecological processes of which they are a part. It is usually considered at three levels: genes, species and ecosystems. Genetic diversity encompasses all the genetic information in every plant, animal and microorganism; that of species comprises all living organisms; and that of ecosystems covers the whole gamut of habitats, biotic communities and ecological processes, as well as the differences within ecosystems. 52. No one has even a rough idea of the number of species on Earth. Best guesses lie between 5 and 80 million or more. Of these, only some 1,4 million have been described at all: 750,000 insects, 41,000 vertebrates and 250,000 plants plus a sundry mixture of invertebrates, fungi, algae and microorganisms.] [127 words]

Let us look at a revealing fact: word wise, the officially published, most prototypical and obsessively faithful translation is 25% longer than the original, but the translation I am suggesting is 20% shorter. Indeed, if the original had been equally relevant, it would have been shorter than its equally relevant translation, since English makes do with fewer grammatical morphemes witness my own backtranslations. Still, the fact remains that, almost by definition, a professional translator ought to be able to write better (not only more elegantly, precisely and succinctly, but, above all, more relevantly with respect to propositional content) than most other mortals in any language, except, of course, the truly great masters or otherwise exceptionally gifted speakers. And, as in life in general, in translation too “better” is almost invariably synonymous with “shorter”. The vaunted assertion that, as a rule,

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translations cannot but be longer than the original is sheer superstition5: As my corpus tends to corroborate again and again, the structural differences between languages enter decidedly into play: other things being equal, translations from Romance languages into English appear to be systematically shorter than translations from English into Romance languages. Barring this objective fact, only when a greater degree of explicitation is required for relevant comprehension in the new reading situation is a translation necessarily longer than the original. It is equally true that differences in hermeneutic ability or sheer informational relevance to the new readership may well advise to shorten a translation. It is to be empirically proved, but I would not be surprised if the fact that apparently most extant translations are indeed longer than their originals is due to a misguided notion of relevance on the part of most translators (relevance theory, after all, is a relative newcomer). Last but not least, what is the measure of length: number of words, of typographical spaces, of syllables, or of letters? Which of these two words is “longer”: thrilled (eight letters, one syllable) or aéreo (five letters, four syllables)? Which of these two phrases: “write it for me now” (five words, nineteen spaces, fourteen letters, five syllables) o “escríbemelo ahora” (two words, seventeen spaces, sixteen letters, six syllables)? But now let us proceed to an in-depth analysis: Several minor modifications have been introduced in Fi that make it much more elegant, clear, idiomatic and succinct without affecting any of the propositional elements. As a result, LPIo/LPCi identity is more relevantly achieved than LPIo/LPCo identity, i.e. the reader of the translation needs less effort in order relevantly to understand on line meaning as originally meant. And in this kind of text, there is absolutely no valid reason for meaning not be accessible on line. As I have pointed out, in multilingual conferences with simultaneous interpretation it is an everyday phenomenon: the poor Japanese delegate mutters his mangled English Fo and, rather than processing such a thankless stimulus, even the British delegates rush to switch to the interpretation into any language they know in the hope of receiving a user-friendlier Fi that will enable them to do less strenuously what they are there to do in the first place: understanding the Japanese

5

The fact that they tend to be anyhow has two explanations. One I find professionally acceptable: when the hermeneutic package of the reader must be boosted (conversely, we will see at work a tendency to generalisation); the other one is more problematic, since it has to do, I submit, with an inadequate assessment of relevance on the part of the translator. Incidentally, Toury’s law of increasing standardisation can be a reflection of more and less competent practices: sometimes changing a texteme by a repertoreme is the right thing to do, relevance wise, sometimes it is simply the lazy thing to do, whereby the reader is cheated of relevant contextual effects. © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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delegation, comprehending their LPI, i.e. producing effortlessly on line their LPC (whether LPCo or LPCi - the least bothersome)6. As a matter of fact, a formal comparison of the original text and its two back-translations from Spanish proves most revealing. They are all verbalisations of the same LPI, except that the last one is much more relevant than its sisters. A conscientious editor might have amended the original text accordingly (except that it would have been probably not worth the effort, time and money7). The translator, however, does not have to work twice, producing first a “faithful,” “semantic,” translation an then amending it in order to make it more relevant. He can telescope both tasks into one and adopt a communicatively relevant strategy from the start. As a matter of fact, such telescoping is but metaphorical: once the LPIo has been seized, good mediators have to make an additional effort if, for whatever reason, they mean not to reverbalise it relevantly8. A more problematic case: Instrumental cum documentary translation Let us tackle a hopeless text, that of a resolution by UNEP (the United Nations Environment Programme) on “gender mainstreaming” (alas, poor English language! I knew it well, Horatio), two of whose more idiosyncratic paragraphs read as follows: 6

Another apparent paradox is that, as translation provides a solution to the problem, the original difficulty is also due to translation. The delegate perceives his LPI in Japanese, through an inner speech act. Thereafter he proceeds labouriously to transform it into an LPI in English, except that he does not quite manage, which results in the deficient English translation that the addressee’s get. Good interpreters proceed inversely: used that they are to dealing with incompetent, abstruse, convoluted or simply mangled Fos, they manage, nevertheless, to infer the LPIo on line - they achieve LPIo/LPCo identity (if not complete, then relevantly enough). Once they have a clear LPCo in their minds, they have no major trouble in articulating it as LPIi through an Fi that is much more adequate, and not only with respect to the grammatical correctness of XnL and the semantic precision of SnH, but also prosody and register, which non natives normally cannot negotiate idiomatically. As born Rhetors, they also produce a better paralinguistic configuration. The result is obvious: Given LPIo/LPIi identity, the original act is less successful than the second one, whereby, ceteris paribus, the interpreter’s addressees will understand better and with less effort than anybody listening to the original. In short, the interpreters’s verbalisation ends up being more relevant than the speaker’s.

7

Nevertheless, at the UN much time, effort and money goes into editing mostly English originals. The editor is the first, mono-lingual mediator, between the author and the potential reader, including the translators. The editor mediates on behalf of the originator of the text and of its translations. 8

And yes, Seleskovitch hit the nail squarely on the head: given an intelligent and self-assured expert interpreter, mediating otherwise demands additional effort - expert interpreters “deverbalise” automatically, or, if you prefer, turn the meaning they have understood into their meaning now meant and verbalise it spontaneously (or almost), which, by definition, means idiomatically, which, by definition, means communicatively, but more of this later. 220

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2. Women play a major role and make environmentally crucial choices in key areas of production as well as consumption affecting the environment in both rural and urban areas. Women must be engaged in environmentally sound action at the local level and in action which promotes the sustainable use of natural resources at all levels. Women’s experiences and expertise of safeguarding the environment while at the same time seeking to ensure adequate and sustainable resource allocations within households and communities must be acknowledged and incorporated into decision-making. 5. The role of the United Nations Environment Programme in the United Nations system and its community of partners for the advancement of women as a means to safeguard the environment is to recognise women and facilitate their environmental education and their access to resources through developing a gender perspective in all the activities of the organizations. The United Nations Environment Programme should develop this role and take women’s experience and knowledge on board by offering equal job opportunities and providing gender-sensitive working conditions.[171 words]

This is a translator’s nightmare, witness: the reeking UNese, the suddenly plummeting register of “taking on board,” the ad nauseam repetition of “women” and “environment,” the wrong construction “of safeguarding” and other moments that show the hole in the non-native speaker’s sock. You may wonder with me a) what the deuce is a “gender perspective,” and what can “gender-sensitive working conditions” possibly mean in real life, and b) how can they be translated into any natural language, English included. The intended function is appellative but it and effect end up mangled yet again. Let me try to lay bare the propositional tree hiding beneath this atrocious foliage: WOMEN i. ii.

(play) major role (make) environmentally crucial choices in key areas production/consumption affecting environment rural/urban i.a. choices must a) locally, be sound b) all levels, promote sustainable use of resources to safeguard environment ensure resource allocations at home/community i.b experience must be acknowledged/incorporated in decisionmaking

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UNEP’s role (with UN and partners) i

(is) to advance women to safeguard environment

ii

is to recognise women to facilitate women’s access to resources ii.a.

through gender perspective in activities

UNEP iii

should develop its role use women’s experience/expertise iii.a.

through equal job opportunities gender sensitive conditions

In other words: 2. Women play an important role and make crucial choices in key areas of production and consumption affecting the environment in both rural and urban areas. They must therefore act in ways that are environmentally sound at the local level and that promote the sustainable use of natural resources at all levels. Their experience and expertise in safeguarding the environment while using resources adequately and sustainably at home and in their communities must be acknowledged and incorporated into decision-making. 5. With respect to the advancement of women as a means of safeguarding the environment, the role of the United Nations Environment Programme in the United Nations system and its partners is to recognise women and facilitate their environmental education and access to resources by introducing a gender perspective in all the activities of the organizations. The United Nations Environment Programme should develop this role and take advantage of women’s experience and knowledge by offering equal job opportunities and providing gender-sensitive working conditions. [162 words]

Since this kind of text is normally the result of a process of negotiations where amendments are suggested, approved, and translated and back-translated ten times over, perhaps delegations may prefer a faithful version of the original to negotiate, and, once it has been approved in its patchwork English avatar (the original above), an intelligible translation to show their Governments and their children. This was the official Spanish translation: 2. Las mujeres desempeñan una función importante y toman decisiones ambientales cruciales en esferas clave de la producción y el consumo que afectan al medio ambiente tanto en las zonas rurales como en las urbanas. Las mujeres deben participar en la adopción de medidas ambientalmente 222

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racionales a nivel local y de medidas que promuevan el uso sostenible de los recursos naturales a todos los niveles. La experiencia y conocimientos de las mujeres en materia de protección del medio ambiente, así como su papel parra asegurar una distribución de recursos adecuada y sostenible en los hogares y las comunidades, deben ser reconocidos e incorporados a los procesos de toma de decisiones. 5. El papel del Programa de las Naciones Unidas para el Medio Ambiente en el sistema de las Naciones Unidas y en su comunidad de asociados para el adelanto de la mujer como medio de proteger el medio ambiente consiste en reconocer y facilitar su educación ambiental y su acceso a los recursos, desarrollando una perspectiva que asegure la igualdad entre los sexos en todas las actividades de las organizaciones. El Programa de las Naciones Unidas para el Medio Ambiente debe desarrollar ese papel y aprovechar la experiencia y el conocimiento de las mujeres ofreciendo iguales oportunidades de empleo y estableciendo condiciones de trabajo que tengan en cuenta la especial situación de la mujer. [222 words]

The translation of the first paragraph tamely follows the original and sounds, of course, every bit as uncouth. Such docility proves unviable in the next paragraph, however. The translator, forced to let go of English, produces a much better Spanish text - much better indeed than the original, which shows that he can translate idiomatically, except that he refuses to, so that, unlike the original, one paragraph is more idiomatic than the other. Specifically, both instances of “gender” have been most aptly solved: 5. The role of the United Nations Environment Programme in the United Nations system and its community of associates for the advancement of women as a means of protecting the environment, consists in recognising and facilitating their environmental education and their access to resources developing a perspective that ensures gender equality in all the activities of the organizations. The United Nations Environment Programme should develop this role and take advantage of women’s experience and knowledge by offering equal job opportunities and establishing working conditions that take into account the special situation of women.

My contention is that the translator chooses and inadequate initial norm: Like his colleague with the biodiversity text, he sets out to follow the original as closely as possible. The original being quite poor, this cannot but lead to an equally poor Spanish text. When the moment arrives that it is no longer possible to stick to the initial norm, the translator cannot but become a free speaker, in the Landan sense, and reverbalise the LPI without any pretence of submission to Fo. Had he set this as his initial norm, the text would have been in its entirety as clear and idiomatic as this one paragraph. In other words, if the Spanish text is almost as calamitous as the original it is not due, then, to the translator’s ineptitude, but to the fact that he applies correctly an incorrect theory. The same

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will happen in the last chapter to that genius Nabokov, not with an inane and trivial text, but with one of the masterpieces of universal literature. I suggest, in that light, the following alternative: 2. Las mujeres desempeñan una función esencial y toman decisiones fundamentales en esferas clave en cuanto a producción y consumo que afectan el medio ambiente así en el campo como en la ciudad. Deben, por ende, ser copartícipes en la adopción de medidas ecológicamente racionales a nivel local, y que propicien un uso sostenible de los recursos naturales a todos los niveles. La experiencia y conocimientos que les permiten proteger debidamente el medio ambiente, velando asimismo por distribuir adecuada y sosteniblemente los recursos en el hogar y la comunidad, deben ser reconocidos e incorporados a la hora de tomar decisiones. 5.En lo que atañe a la promoción de la mujer como medio de proteger el medio ambiente, el papel del Programa de las Naciones Unidas para el Medio ambiente dentro del sistema de las Naciones Unidas y sus colaboradores y homólogos consiste en reconocer y facilitar su instrucción ecológica y acceso a los recursos, promoviendo en toda actividad de las organizaciones la igualdad de los sexos. El Programa de las Naciones Unidas para el Medio ambiente debe acrecentar ese papel y aprovechar la experiencia y conocimientos de las mujeres ofreciendo iguales oportunidades de empleo y creando condiciones de trabajo idóneas desde el punto de vista de la condición de la mujer. [210 words] [2. Women play an essential role and make crucial decisions in key production and consumption areas that affect the environment both in rural and urban areas. They must, therefore, participate on an equal footing in the adoption of measures that are ecologically sound at the local level, and that promote a sustainable use of resources at all levels. Their experience and knowledge, which enable them duly to protect the environment, while looking at the same time after a fair and sustainable use of resources at home and in the community, must be acknowledged and incorporated into decision-making. 5. With respect to the advancement of women as a means of safeguarding the environment, the role of the United Nations Environment Programme in the United Nations system and its partners is to recognise them and facilitate their environmental education and access to resources by introducing gender equality in all the activities of the organizations. The United Nations Environment Programme should develop this role and take advantage of women’s experience and knowledge by offering equal job opportunities and providing working conditions are adequate to the status of women. [185 words]

We can now see that the model of prototypical translation, in which a translator limits himself to assume his LPCo in order simply to reverbalise it as LPIi is not enough to establish qualitative differences between translators or their translated texts, since it only allows for a Manichean dichotomy between

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translation and non-translation. It is essential to salvage notions such as functionality, skopos, loyalty and, generally speaking, relevance. Documentary translation proper It would seem that here there is no freedom to be exercised at all: How could a mediator “manipulate” say a birth, residence, marriage, divorce or death certificate? Simple: whenever relevance criteria (i.e. acceptability) change, it is the mediator who decides whether the translation is to conform to target-culture intertextuality or the text is to be reproduced in all its “exoticness” - from the month/day/year day/month/year order to the conversion of magnitudes, through the adaptation of addresses and the translation or transliteration of proper names. And not only that -which is quite a bit- but also the inclusion, condensation or suppression of information that is not relevant for the purposes of the translation’s addressee and self-defeat the applicant’s interests. For instance, those hobbies that Americans deem indispensable to consign in their résumés and that in a Spanish curriculum vitae tend to be totally out of place, or the verbosity of Spanish CVs that Americans find so bothersome; or information that is only relevant ad intra, such as “This passport is issued under decree XXX,” which will probably be of no interest to the target bureaucrat. It is also the mediator who decides whether the Commonwealth of Massachusetts stays a Commonwealth or becomes a State - which is what it constitutionally is and what counts in practically any translation of any civil document produced in Boston and its surroundings. As always, what matters is relevant identity between meaning as meant by the issuing authority and as comprehended by the one reading its translation, determined, above all, by the specific purposes of the translation. These purposes can be established by the issuing authority, the client, a third party or the target authority. Of course, what counts in the end is the document’s acceptability by the target addressee: It is of little import that the issuing authority certifies if the target one rejects the certification. If it does accept it, however, then formal correspondence between the original certificate and its translation loses relevance. And, often, only the mediator knows the target acceptability criteria. Hyper-documentary translation At a meeting I was servicing back in April 1991, the then Soviet Union submitted the following paper on disarmament:

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OБЪEKTИBHAЯ ИНФOPMAЦИЯ ПO BOEHHЫM BOПРOCAM Цeли, принципы и мeхaнизмы oткрытости в военной cфeрe Рaбoчий документ, представлeнный Сoюзoм Сoвeтcких Социалиcтичecких Рecпублик B целях coдeйcтвия прeврaщeнию вoeннoй oткрытocти и унивeрcaльную нoрму мeждунaрoднoй жизни можно былo бы договоритьcя o тoм, чтoбы мeры oткрытости под эгидoй OOH, a чacтнocти, npeдусматривали: - eжeгoднoe прeдocтaвлeниe гocудaрcтвaми в OOH нa дoбрoвoльнoй ocнoвe дaнных пo чиcлeннocти их вooружeнных сил (oбщeй и в рaзбивкe пo ocповным видaм – cухoпутныe вoйcкa, BBC, BMC, прочиe); по ocнoвным видaм вooружeний (тaнки, бoeвыe брoнирoвaнныe мaшины, aртиллeрия, бoeвыe caмoлeты и вeртoлeты, крупныe нaдвoдныe кoрaбли (включaя дecaнтныe), пoдвoдныe лoдки); по чиcлeннocти вoйcк зa прeдeлaми пaциoнaльнoй тeрритoрии; для ядeрных дeржaв – тaкжe пo пуcкoвым уcтaнoвкaм MБP, БPПЛ, TБ, тaктичecким ядeрным рaкeтaм нaзeмнoгo бaзирoвaния; - eжeгoднoe прeдcтaвлeниe гocудaрcтвaми нa дoбрoвoльнoй ocнoвe дaнных в дeйcтвующую в OOH cтaндaртизировaнную cиcтeму oтчeтнocти o вoeнных рacрoдaх; - пoвышeниe прeдcкaзуeмoсти вoeнногo cтрoитeльcтвa гocудaрcтв – членoв OOH путeм взaимнoгo oбecпeчeния глacнoгo хaрaктeрa вoeнных бюджeтoв гocудaрcтв – члeнoв OOH.

For the benefit of the reader for whom Russian is a mystery, I am providing the following semantic translation - the kind Nabokov inflicts upon Pushkin’s Eugene Oneguin, except that in this instance the original is almost every bit as dreadful: For instance, “osnova” and its derivates are repeated as many times as “basis” and its kin in the translation. The last paragraph, by the way, is every bit as much of a gem in the original: OBJECTIVE INFORMATION ON MILITARY QUESTIONS Aims, principles and mechanisms of openness in the military sphere Working document submitted by the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics In order to help the transformation of military openness into a universal norm of international life it would be possible to agree that measures of openness under the aegis of the UN, in particular, provided for: - the annual submission by states to the UN on a voluntary basis of data about the numbers of their armed forces (globally and pro rata by basic types -

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land troops, MAF9, MNF10, other); by basic types of armaments (tanks, armoured combat vehicles, artillery, combat aeroplanes and helicopters, major surface ships (including landing ones), submarines); by numbers of troops outside national territory; for nuclear powers - also by launching installations for IBM, BMLS11, HB12, land based tactical nuclear missiles; - annual submission by states on a voluntary basis of data to the effective at the UN standardised system of accounting for military expenditures; - increase of the predictability of the military construction of statesmembers of the UN by means of mutual assurances of the transparent character of the military budgets of the states-members of the UN. [176 words]

The semantic translation into Spanish, by the way, demands all of 258 words: INFORMACIÓN OBJETIVA SOBRE CUESTIONES MILITARES Objetivos, principios y mecanismos de la apertura en la esfera militar Documento de trabajo presentado por la Unión de Repúblicas Socialistas Soviéticas A fin de contribuir a la transformación de la apertura militar en norma universal de la vida internacional se podría convenir en que las medidas de apertura bajo la égida de la ONU, en particular, previeran: - la presentación anual por los estados a la ONU sobre una base voluntaria de datos acerca de la composición cuantitativa de sus fuerzas armadas (general y prorrateada por tipos fundamentales: tropas de infantería, FAM, FNM, otros); por tipos fundamentales de armas (tanques, vehículos blindados de combate, artillería, aviones y helicَpteros de combate, grandes navíos de superficie (incluidos los de desembarco), submarinos); acerca de composición cuantitativa de sus tropas fuera de los límites del territorio nacional; para las potencias nucleares, también acerca de sus instalaciones de lanzamiento de MBI, MBLS, BT, misiles nucleares tácticos basados en tierra; - la presentación anual por los estados sobre una base voluntaria de datos al sistema estandarizado de contabilidad de gastos militares vigente en la ONU;

9

MAF = military air forces (VVS = vojénno-vozdúshnyje síly).

10

MNF = military naval forces (VMS = vojénno-morskíje síly).

11

.BMLS = ballistic missiles on submarines (BRPL = ballistícheskije rakjéty na podvýdnykh lódkakh). 12

HB = heavy bombers (TB = tjazhólyje bombardiróvshiki). © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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- el aumento en la predecibilidad de la constricción militar de los estados miembros de la ONU mediante una mutua garantía del carácter transparente de los presupuestos militares de los estados miembros de la ONU.

Now this text is not written by Pushkin or Tolstoy, but by a Third Secretary at the Soviet Mission to the UN, so the translator better not unduly tamper with it! It is, after all, the position of the (then) other nuclear superpower on a most delicate issue: transparency in military expenditures. Now I ask, if this is not the authoritativest of texts, what is? And if this text does not demand the documentariest of translations, what does? Except that this text is also a mess. Either it was written by a CIA mole or its awkwardness is unintentional. It ranges from incoherent (how do you submit information “to” a standardised system?) to simply clumsy. Cohesion is mostly up to the benevolence of the reader. Intertextuality is flouted by improper lexicon, acceptability - by cryptic acronyms and convoluted syntax, and intentionality - by general fuzziness and obscurity: are the Soviets suggesting, proposing or requesting? Of all these obvious flaws, the latter is probably intentional (to be reproduced, then, in our translation). Also, it is the only one the reader can easily live with, since it does not compromise his general understanding of the text. All the rest makes for excruciating reading. And yet, the function is clearly persuasive: the USSR’s intention is to convince other delegations. It is obvious that the intended function is defeated by the overall ineptness of the text, which leads to an effect all but opposed to the one pursued. Be that as it may, we, translators, are generally paid to be cooperative; let us assume that the USSR is making a sensible if probably controversial proposal - sensible with respect to its world: that of the motivations of its author. In order to cooperate, we must try and go beyond its unfriendly surface to its intended sense. We shall approach it with the benevolence we would bestow upon a foreigner whose linguistic ability is no reliable token of his overall intelligence, sanity or honesty. We shall assume that the text expresses one or more basic macro-propositions articulated through several structured propositions, themselves built out of diverse constituents. For this we will bring to bear all our relevant knowledge. The text will tell us something relevant that we presumably do not know about something that we presumably do. Our understanding of the text could be summarised as follows: MILITARY OPENNESS should be a universal norm for this agree following measures under UN i.a

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states submit voluntarily data on strength a) globally, b) per type

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c) per armaments c) troops abroad b

nuclear states - also launching installations

ii.

states submit voluntarily data according to UN accounting system

iii.a

states assure mutual transparency military budgets

b

[transparency] in order to increase predictability of military construction

Once more, the schematic presentation is much clearer than the text itself - i.e. the author is not good at saying what he means. Within the pragmatic intention of the author, details that usefully expand or develop the speaker’s intended sense are rhetorically good details; details that distort, obfuscate or confuse it are rhetorically bad details; and details that contradict or defeat it are wrong details. Whether they are to be kept, modified or suppressed in the translation is up to the translator, of course, but they are not equal. By faithfully rendering bad and wrong details, the mediator will be betraying the author’s intention; by remedying them, he will be betraying the text’s form; by sticking to a middle course, he will be betraying both. As usual with our profession, damn if he does and damn if he does not. So should the mediator translate the uncouth original or a mentally edited version? Even if he could have sought guidance from someone in the Soviet delegation, he might have received different answers: the author himself might have besought him to be more articulate than he, whilst his subordinates would probably have commanded the mediator to stick to every syllable their boss had written in his putative wisdom. One could think that, in any event, the mediator’s back is as covered as his wings are tied up by the originator’s editorial policy. One could think again, witness the completely different approaches by the English, French and Spanish translators: INFORMATIONS OBJECTIVES SUR LES QUESTIONS MILITAIRES La franchise dans le domaine militaire : objectifs, principes et mécanismes Document de travail présenté par l’Union des Républiques socialistes soviétiques En vue à contribuer à faire de la franchise dans le domaine militaire une norme universelle de la vie internationale, on pourrait décider notamment d’adopter, sous l’égide de l’ONU, les mesures suivantes : -

Tous les ans, les états soumettraient à l’ONU, à titre volontaire, des données concernant leurs forces armées effectives (globalement et par arme - infanterie, armée de l’air, marine, et autres) ; par type © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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d’armements (chars, véhicules blindés militaires, artillerie, avions et hélicoptères de combat, gros navires (y compris les navires de débarquement), sous-marins) ; effectifs des forces armées au-delà des limites du territoire national ; pour les puissances nucléaires également par base de lancement de missiles balistiques intercontinentaux, de missiles balistiques lancés par sous-marin, de bombardiers lourds et de missiles nucléaires tactiques basés à terre ; -

Tous les ans, les états présenteraient, à titre volontaire, des données selon le système d’établissement de rapports normalisés sur les dépenses militaires, mis en place sous les auspices de l’ONU ;

-

Une assurance mutuelle de transparence des budgets militaires augmenterait la prévisibilité en ce qui concerne les constructions militaires des états Membres de l’ONU. [202 words]

******* INFORMACION OBJETIVA SOBRE CUESTIONES DE DESARME Propósitos, principios y mecanismos de la apertura en la esfera militar Documento de trabajo presentado por la Unión de Repúblicas Socialistas Soviéticas Con el fin de contribuir a que la apertura militar se trasforme en norma universal de la vida internacional se podría convenir en que las medidas de apertura que se adoptasen bajo el patrocinio de las Naciones Unidas previeran en particular lo siguiente:

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-

Presentación anual a las Naciones Unidas por parte de los Estados, a título voluntario, de datos sobre el número de sus fuerzas armadas (en total y desglosadas por tipos principales - fuerzas terrestres, aéreas, navales y otras); sobre los tipos fundamentales de armamentos (tanques, vehículos militares blindados, artillería, aeronaves y helicópteros militares, grandes buques de superficie (incluidas barcazas de desembarco), submarinos); sobre el número de contingentes fuera de los límites del territorio nacional; en el caso de las Potencias nucleares, también datos sobre las instalaciones de lanzamiento de misiles balísticos intercontinentales, misiles balísticos lanzados desde submarinos, bombarderos pesados y misiles tácticos con base en tierra;

-

Presentación anual por parte de los Estados, a título voluntario, de datos sobre el sistema vigente de las Naciones Unidas para la normalización de informes sobre gastos militares;

-

Aumento de la previsibilidad de la estructura militar de los Estados Miembros de las Naciones Unidas mediante un convenio recíproco de garantizar la transparencia de los presupuestos militares de dichos Estados Miembro. [235 words]

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The respective semantic back-translations of which would yield in the case of French: OBJECTIVE INFORMATION ON MILITARY QUESTIONS Openness in the military sphere: aims, principles and mechanisms Working document submitted by the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics With a view to make openness in the military sphere a universal norm of international life, it might be decided in particular to adopt, under the aegis of the United Nations, the following measures: Every year, States would submit to the United Nations, on a voluntary basis, information about their effective armed forces (globally and by service infantry, military armoured vehicles, artillery, combat aeroplanes and helicopters, large ships (including landing ships), submarines); armed forces troops outside the limits of the national territory; for nuclear powers also by launching base for intercontinental ballistic missiles, submarine-launched ballistic missiles, heavy bombers and land-based tactical nuclear missiles; -

Every year, States would submit to the United Nations, on a voluntary basis, information according to the system for the presentation of standardized reports on military expenditures, established under the auspices of the United Nations;

-

A mutual assurance of the transparency of military budgets would increase the predictability with respect to military constructions by United Nations Member States.[187 words]

And the in the case of Spanish: OBJECTIVE INFORMATION ON MILITARY QUESTIONS Aims, principles and mechanisms of openness in the military sphere Working document submitted by the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics In order to contribute to turn military openness into a universal norm of international life it could be agreed that openness measures adopted under the auspices of the United Nations provided in particular for the following: -

Annual submission to the United Nations by States, on a voluntary basis, of information on the number of their armed forces (as a whole and broken down by main types - land, air, naval and other armed forces); on basic types of armaments (tanks, armoured military vehicles, artillery, military aircraft and helicopters, large surface ships (including landing craft), submarines); on the number of units outside the limits of the national territory; in the case of nuclear Powers, also information on launching installations for intercontinental ballistic © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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missiles; submarine-launched ballistic missiles, heavy bombers and land-based tactical nuclear missiles; -

Annual submission to the United Nations by States, on a voluntary basis, of information on the prevailing United Nations system for the standardization of reports on military expenditures;

-

An increase in the predictability of the military structure of United Nations Member States through a mutual agreement to ensure the transparency of military budgets of such Member States. [213 words]

Which we can compare to the official English version: OBJECTIVE INFORMATION ON MILITARY QUESTIONS Aims, principles and mechanisms of openness in the military sphere Working paper submitted by the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics In order to help ensure that military openness becomes a universal norm of international life, it might be possible to agree that measures to promote such openness, specifically under the auspices of the United Nations, provide for the following: The annual voluntary submission by States to the United Nations of information on the strength of their armed forces (both as a whole and by principal service - army, air force, navy, etc.); on basic types of arms (tanks, armoured cars, artillery, military aeroplanes and helicopters, major surface vessels (including landing craft) and submarines); on levels of forces outside national territory; and, for nuclear Powers, on launching systems for intercontinental and submarine-based ballistic missiles, heavy bombers and surface-based tactical nuclear forces; The annual voluntary submission by States of information to the existing standardized United Nations reporting system for military expenditures; An increase in the predictability of the military construction programmes of United Nations Member States through mutual assurances of transparency of the military budgets of such Member States. [191 words]

The first thing we can notice is the different graphic layout of the original, the English, and the French and Spanish versions. It is obvious that the latter are more logical and easier to follow. The original has the ticks, but is not indented. The French and Spanish editors (layout is not decided by translators) did the logical thing: since there are ticks, let there be indentation; their English colleague reasoned the other way round: since there is no indentation, let there be no ticks. Content wise, the English and Spanish translations go suspiciously and rather clumsily hand in hand; one can readily guess that they are more 232

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“semantic,” or, rather, literal. The French, perennially longer than Spanish, is here the tersest of the two, and it flows more smoothly; simply put, it is much better written both than the original and than the other two translations - which does not mean that it is flawless. The Spanish looks more negligent already from the first paragraph: It carries over the awkward repetition of “otkrýtost” [openness/franchise/apertura], whilst the French does away with it and the English mitigates it by stressing cohesion with “such.” After “vida internacional,” moreover, there should be a comma, as in the other two translations - even if not in the original. The English text, on its part, boasts a rather infelicitous “specifically” that adds nothing but confusion. Stylistically, a comparison of the Spanish and French versions of the following two paragraphs proves most illustrative: Whilst the French translator goes for conjugated verbs (“soumettraient,” “présenteraient,” “augmenterait”), my Spanish colleague gets into the straightjacket of our hopelessly indocile nouns: “presentación,” “presentación” (sloppily repeated), “aumento”; which necessitates the preposition “de” and makes all the circumstantial complements drag jarringly along. Unlike promiscuous English nouns -who will say yes to any preposition- in Spanish, nouns are very remiss to accept prepositions other than “de”; witness the cumbersome “Presentación anual a las Naciones Unidas por parte de los Estados, a título voluntario, de datos...” A construction such as “Que los Estados presentaran voluntariamente a las Naciones Unidas datos...,” with one preposition instead of five would have been much smoother. But let us delve into content: What about “el número de sus fuerzas armadas” [the number of their armed forces]? Basically three, I submit: army, air force, and navy. None of the three languages has a noun equivalent to “chísljennost”; yet both the English and French translators find their way easily around it. Their Spanish counterpart strives for a noun semantically connected with “chisló” [number] - except that there is no apt one to be found. The French goes for “forces armées effectives”; it is not a contresens - after all what is meant is actual level of forces; but why not simply the natural -and therefore adequate- “effectifs”? “Par arme,” instead, is an excellent example of the translator using the right terminology at his own initiative (he could have written “type” and be done with it); the same goes for his English colleague’s choice of “service.” Unfortunately, he was blinded by his own prowess, since “infanterie” is but one of several components of land-based forces, together with “artillerie” and others. “Sukhopútnyje” literally means “land-faring”; whereby “sukhopútnyje vojská” [land-faring troops] are, as the English rightly has it, the “army,” as opposed to the “air force” and the “navy,” the Russian word for “infantry” being “pjekhóta.” By juxtaposing a hyponym of “armée de terre,” with the hypernyms “armée de l’air” and “marine,” moreover, the translator couples mistakes at two different levels: stylistic lack of cohesion, and semantic inaccuracy. By the way, I am not sure about French, but in Spanish dashes follow exactly the same rules as brackets: once opened, they must be closed. (It

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is standard practice to spell out in the other languages acronyms such as MBR [mjezhkontinjentálnye ballistícheskije rakjéty], BRPL [ballistícheskije rakjéty vypúshennykh iz podvódnykh lódok], and TB [tjazhóllyje bombardiróvschiki], that the Russian original uses a-systematically, thus torpedoing its own inner cohesion.) Then come the English “armoured cars,” turned into “véhicules blindés militaires” in French and “vehículos militares blindados” in Spanish. What are they, “armoured cars” that are “military” or “military cars” that are “armoured”? It is not a trivial point: banks use armoured cars that are not military, and the army has military cars that are not armoured. But then, what are we talking about if not “military” hardware? Why not simply “véhicules blindés” and “vehículos blindados”? Of course, the Russian has the extra adjective “bojevýje”; except that it means “combat” rather than “military” - a crucial difference. The English is wrong in omitting it: an observation armoured car is not a combat vehicle. The Spanish and French do worse, they turn a semantically loaded distinctive adjective into an inane, unnecessary attribute. Here, as elsewhere in this as well as in any other texts, the guiding principle should be extra-linguistic reality - in this specific case, the referent; in this as in any non-fictional text, it is only against reality that possible interpretations of linguistic meaning into sense, into meaning actually meant by the author, can be tested, accepted or rejected. Next we duck at the roar of approaching “military aeroplanes and helicopters,” “aeronaves y helicópteros militares,” and “avions et hélicoptères de combat.” To begin with, an “aeronave” is a “vehicle capable of flying,” and therefore the hypernym of both “avión” and “helicóptero” - exactly the same as “aircraft” with respect to “aeroplane” and “helicopter”; and that is precisely why the English translator eschewed it. But, more importantly, did the (then) Soviets really intend that training and cargo aeroplanes, as well as other “military” but definitely “non-combat” aircraft, be included in the information? I doubt it. This time it is the French who got the “bojevýje” right (but then why now and not before?). Now for the “major surface vessels (including landing craft),” “grandes buques de superficie (incluidas barcazas de desembarco),” and “gros navires (y compris les navires de débarquement)”: “landing craft” are not “major vessels,” nor are “barcazas de desembarco.” Only the French translator got it semantically right (but then not stylistically: the second “navires” is easily replaced by “ceux”). It does not take a specialist to tell the difference: anybody who has seen Sands of Iwo Jima or any other such movie could. What is meant are “landing ships” or “buques de desembarco,” such as HMS Sir Galahad, set ablaze by the Argentineans in the South Atlantic in 1982 (the picture made it to the front page of every newspaper in the world), a fact that neither the English nor the Spanish -of all translators!- had an excuse not to know back in 1991. A modicum of knowledge of the world actually put to use while translating should 234

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have been enough. Otherwise, sheer semantic lore ought to have sufficed, at least in Spanish: there is simply no way any “barcaza” can be counted among “grandes buques de superficie.” We now proceed to the “levels of forces outside national territory,” “effectifs des forces armées au-delà des limites du territoire national,” “número de contingentes fuera de los límites del territorio nacional.” “Des limites”/“de los límites” are an unnecessary over-translation of “za prjedjélami” (a noun indispensable in Russian, since “za” alone would mean “behind” rather than “outside”); they add nothing but words, including yet another parasitic “de”: French and Spanish can simply say “hors du territoire national”/“fuera del territorio nacional.” But the latter makes a crucial mistake: it is not a matter of how many units, but how many men. Both the English and the French convey precisely that; the Spanish should have said “efectivos” - and nothing else: “des forces armées” is again parasitic. I also miss a comma after “puissances nucleaires.” Lastly, it is “land-based tactical nuclear missiles” (as opposed to those launched from ships) and not “surface-based” (as opposed to submarinelaunched) as the English mistakenly has it. In Spanish the standard expression, by the way, is “misiles nucleares tácticos de emplazamiento terrestre.” In the following paragraph, the Spanish translator smells a rat: Submitting information to an information system sounds wrong, so he looks for a preposition that will make sense, wherefore we get “datos sobre [on] el sistema vigente de las Naciones Unidas.” If “to” is obviously wrong; “on” is worse: being plausible, it is therefore downright misleading. Neither “to” nor “on,” but “according to” (“de conformidad con”/“conforme a”/“según”/“con arreglo a”) once sense has been inferred, there is a bounty of possibilities to convey it. To boot, placed after the noun “sistema,” “vigente” becomes clearly distinctive, i.e. the reporting system prevailing at the United Nations as opposed to those obtaining elsewhere. True, the original itself is all but hopeless. The English follows it quite closely, and ends up almost as gnarled. The French is semantically “unfaithful” but obviously makes the right sense (whereby the original would be better amended in the light of its translation, as it is often the case); the Spanish misses twice. The verb, of course, would have made things easier: “Que los Estados ofreciesen voluntariamente información con arreglo a...” In the last paragraph, the French translator abandons the previous construction, thereby torpedoing cohesion. I suspect the reason lies in a (justifiable) attempt at pruning the utterance of cumbersome repetitions, and an (erroneously) perceived need to rhematise “constructions militaires.” The Spanish keeps the noun and, not surprisingly, havoc ensues: “Aumento de la previsibilidad de la estructura militar de los Estados Miembros de las Naciones Unidas mediante un convenio recíproco de garantizar la transparencia de los presupuestos militares de dichos Estados Miembros” [increase of the predictability of the military structure of the Member States of the United

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Nations through a reciprocal covenant of (sic) assuring the transparency of the military budgets of said Member States]. Let us put that into more palatable Spanish: “Que los Estados adoptaran, a fin de aumentar la previsibilidad de su estructura militar, un convenio que garantizase la transparencia de sus respectivos presupuestos militares.” “Estados,” capitalised and on its own, makes “Miembros de las Naciones Unidas” even more redundant than it would have been otherwise; the fact that it is sloppily repeated in the original is already more than a motive to mistrust its appropriateness. “Convenio recíproco” is a solecism, let alone the fact that the original does not for a moment suggest any kind of new legal instrument. But the real semantic problem is “stroítjelstvo” [construction/ construction/structura]. The Spanish translator smells another rat: “construcción militar” [military construction] does not sound right, so he opts for abandoning “construcción” altogether. The 1981 Dictionary of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR gives “organizátsija” as the second meaning of “stroítjelstvo,” and so does the Sopena Russian-Spanish dictionary; I guess that is whence “estructura” hails. But if the Spanish translator did realise that “construcción” alone sounded out of place, he failed once again to consider whether his remedy was not worse than the malady. It is not enough to be aware that “construcción” cannot be: one must take a step further and ponder what it actually can be. Obviously, another possible interpretation of “stroítjelstvo,” or, rather, what the author means by it is the “construction” of military installations. The English translator understands it correctly: it is indeed construction - of military installations and premises; all it takes is adding “programmes,” so that “construction” is no longer semantically orphaned. In all, it is precisely because the French opts more consistently for sense over words that it can be both more idiomatic and elegant, and -at times- even more accurate. Its flaws lie not so much in an excessive linguistic liberalness, but in an insufficient weighing of the author’s actual intention. The translator still pays too much attention to words (the words in the target language, for a positive change) to the detriment of sense; whereas the aim of deverbalisation is not exclusively -or even mainly- a linguistically apter translation, but indeed one both more faithful to the intention behind the original and relevant to the reader. Most of the mistakes and infelicities in al thee versions can be explained by the off-putting awkwardness of an eminently authoritative text that had to be translated under extreme time pressure. Had the translators been given a second chance, or a reviser intervened, the published texts would have been mostly flawless, but that is not the way things tend to work in the harried UN environment - or the private market, for that matter. I am glad I have this corpus to prove, I hope, that sheer description will not carry us far enough for any relevant practical purposes: barring their infelicities, these translations follow very different initial norms, and I humbly vociferate that the French mediator adopted by far the best, most modern, most 236

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effective norm for the purposes in hand. It can be still argued that this is an “authoritative” text and that it is not the translator’s business to judge it -much less improve upon it- in any way. I for one disagree, but that is of no consequence; what is, instead, somewhat bewildering, is that all three official versions by the same hyperoriginator (i.e. the UN as opposed to its different translation sections) follow different initial norms, so whichever you like best, then the others follow a “wrong” or at least “less apt” initial norm. If description has proven extremely useful so far, now its validity is exhausted: Which norm is better? Why? Theoretical quibbles aside, we have seen that none of the translations is completely adequate. The English, though semantically the most faithful, is stylistically more literal and, therefore, awkward. The French, dancing more elegantly -if not always to the beat of sense- makes a more systematic attempt at deverbalisation, i.e. abandoning the structures and words of the original in favour of making sense more clearly and idiomatically. That norm could have been usefully followed both in English and Spanish as I suggest below, with the more coherent typographic layout of the official French and Spanish versions: With a view to promoting military openness as a universal norm of international relations, the following measures within the framework of the United Nations could be agreed: -

The annual voluntary submission by States to the United Nations of data on the numbers of their troops (globally and broken down by service - army, air force, navy, and other); about basic types of armaments (tanks, armoured combat vehicles, artillery, combat aeroplanes and helicopters, major surface vessels -including landing ships- and submarines); about levels of forces outside their national territory; and, for nuclear powers - on launching platforms for intercontinental ballistic missiles, submarine-launched ballistic missiles, heavy bombers and land-based tactical nuclear missiles;

-

The annual voluntary submission by States of data under the standardized United Nations system of accounting for military expenditures;

-

Increased predictability of the military development programmes of States through mutual assurances of transparency in their military budgets. [148 words13]

****** Para contribuir a que la apertura militar pase a ser norma de la vida internacional, podría convenirse en que entre las medidas patrocinadas por las Naciones Unidas figurasen en particular las siguientes: 13

Notice that, as opposed to the official one, this translation is not longer than the original. © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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S

Que los Estados presentaran a las Naciones Unidas anualmente y en forma voluntaria datos sobre sus efectivos (globalmente y desglosados por arma: ejército, aviación, marina y otros); tipos fundamentales de armamentos (tanques, vehículos blindados de combate, artillería, aviones y helicópteros de combate, grandes buques de superficie incluidos los de desembarco- y submarinos); efectivos estacionados fuera del territorio nacional; y, en el caso de las Potencias nucleares, también sobre plataformas de lanzamiento de misiles balísticos intercontinentales, misiles balísticos lanzados desde submarinos, bombarderos pesados y misiles nucleares tácticos de emplazamiento terrestre;

-

Que los Estados presentaran anualmente y en forma voluntaria datos con arreglo al sistema de las Naciones Unidas para la normalización de la contabilidad de gastos militares;

-

Que los Estados convinieran, a fin de aumentar la previsibilidad de sus programas de producción militar, en velar por la transparencia de sus respectivos presupuestos militares. [171 words]

Documentary cum literary translation In The Old Patagonian Express, Paul Théroux writes: “I asked the sleeping car attendant what was up. The tracks he said. Somewhere down the line there was a break in the tracks, either flooding or a landslide... It was serious: something to do with a volcano.” (p. 359)

A couple of pages later, a passenger confirms it to him: “There was a volcano further south, he said; it had caused a mudslide and ripped the tracks apart.”

An American from Boston or a non-vernacular Spanish speaker may indeed find it perfectly plausible that an eruption has taken place in the midst of the Argentine north, but, the fact is there are no active volcanoes around. A few pages further, Théroux himself realises it and comments to a fellow traveller: “‘I didn’t realize there were volcanoes here.’ ‘No, the town is called Volcano.’ I had got it wrong: what I had taken to be a volcano -the descriptions I had heard up the line- was just the name of a town.”

So now he knows too. But how is the confusion possible? Théroux is puzzled that there might be volcanoes in the area; his Argentine interlocutor tells him that what happens is that the village is called “Volcano.” Théroux does not understand, as I’ll reveal in a moment, that the gaucho has understood his

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question, but not the motivation behind it. In other words, my fellow citizen understands what the American is asking, but not why or what for he is asking. Unlike the gaucho, you (now that I have initiated you) and I know, as part of our hermeneutic package, that what puzzles Théroux is the repeated mention of a certain volcano as the cause of the railroad shambles; the fact that the village is called “Volcán” is strictly irrelevant. Neither the Argentinian nor Théroux are really to blame for the misunderstanding; this kind of short circuit is most usual in any kind of communication. Due to his own prior incomprehension, Théroux does not realise that the gaucho has no way of guessing the motive of his curiosity and he does not quite manage to ask what he really wants to know, so that his interlocutor answers the question without addressing the doubt. This example reveals two comprehension problems, which are in turn problems of translation, since Théroux has been translating into and from Spanish. The first one has to do with the linguistic part of the hermeneutic package. Théroux does not understand his interlocutors because he does not know their language well enough. The second one has to do with the extralinguistic part: the gaucho does not understand Théroux because he is not aware of the background. Let us take knowledge of extralinguistic reality: As I was travelling in the north of Argentina a few summers ago, I often found that the road had been wiped out by sudden landslides. I found it most strange that local people would systematically attribute them to “el Volcán” (the volcano). In all probability, the village in Théroux’s book is called “El Volcán” because of the landslides, but since Théroux cannot possible know it, he is satisfied with the answer he gets. He does what most of us do when faced with the unexplainable: he accepts the first more or less plausible answer to come his way (Sperber and Wilson would say the first answer compatible with the relevance principle). Except that sometimes it is not the good one and all we do is to substitute one superstition for another (a frequent bane in the case of translators), satisfied that the incongruence between what we did not know and what we believe to have understood has disappeared. Théroux asks about “volcanoes” in the plural, and the local guy corroborates to him that there are no volcanoes, without understanding, as we have seen, that the motivation that moves the speaker to ask the question is curiosity about the origin of the landslide - which is not “el volcán,” but “el Volcán” (the distinction, of course, can be seen but not heard). This brings us to another problem: the linguistic part of the hermeneutic package. As he repeatedly acknowledges, Théroux does not know Spanish. Except that Spanish does not exist: it is but a statistical abstraction from countless specific speech acts by specific speakers in specific times and places, whose more generally known sediments end up embalmed and consigned in dictionaries and grammar books (which, by definition, are systematically obsolete). Each of the speakers of Spanish has his own Spanish, and each social group has their own (adolescents, women, salteños, Colombians, etc.). As these individual or collective Spanishes draw apart, they become mutually

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unintelligible. Naturally, the differences between them are not so many or so substantive that people cannot communicate effectively with each other (and that is why we can say that you and I and all our fellow human beings who speak all those different Englishes, speak one language; but it is only a necessary practical fiction, such as believing that solid objects are, in fact, solid). Now, as can be seen, the little Spanish Théroux knows and on the basis of which he infers the locals’ meaning meant is not the Spanish they speak: in that Spanish, “el Volcán” is the proper name of a specific natural phenomenon (a bit like “el Niño”), which in other Spanishes, even within Argentina herself, does not have one and is simply called “aluvión,” i.e. landslide. So that Théroux got it wrong twice in translation: he did not understand the language he was addressed in (and that, and no other, was the one needed to know in order to translate), and he did not fully apply his common sense (he did not quite understand that the name of the village did not explain the event), What about us? In order to understand it we must meticulously apply our hermeneutic package (our knowledge of Théroux’s English and Argentine orography, our knowledge of Théroux’s ignorance of the local Spanish, and, above all, our common sense). It is possible -if not all too probable- that we are also mistaken. In any event, in view of that interpretation of Théroux’s LPIi and the situation, how do we translate? As always, it depends. If it is an instrumental translation we are after, i.e. a text that will function in the target culture, and not necessarily literature, as an autonomous piece, as, say, a travel guide, then we do not need to pay much attention to our text’s representativity. We would use Théroux’s original as a welcome map of an unfamiliar territory and use it as a reference guide for studying that territory, but it is the territory we are interested in, rather than the specific cartographer’s or explorer’s particular experience or slant. However, if our aim is a documentary translation, i.e. a text that is to function in the target literature as a representative of Théroux’s book and not as a completely autonomous text, the strategy will be a different one: Now we must try and make perceive that territory both through the author’s eyes and sensitivity -which should not be too difficult- and through the author’s idiosyncratic use of language to express his personal view, which will pose the problem of finding a relevantly similar or equivalent way of using our own language so as to “make our reader believe” that it is the author who is actually speaking ours. And there is, of course, the eternal problem of the possible differences in the hermeneutic package presumably shared by the author and his direct interlocutors and the ones now obtaining between his/their package and that of the new readership - or those of the new readerships. And there is, on top of it all, what will presumably engage the new readers’ attention. In other words, when it comes to what relevance theory calls interpretive or descriptive use, we must determine what kind(s) of resemblance other than propositional is/are relevant, and here is where relevance theory leaves us: at the doorway of translation, but without really getting us in. 240

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We cannot even begin to translate without having decided on a strategy, since it will govern all our tactical options. In this specific case, the answer seems obvious: we would translate “Théroux’s book”, rather than a travel guide. And in order to translate “Théroux’s book” we must put ourselves squarely in his shoes, we must write as if we were he, making his meaning meant ours (in so far as we are able a) to identify it and b) to reproduce it, of course). But the buck does not stop here. If we know what for we are translating, we still have to determine for whom. It is not enough to have assumed the author’s intended sense: we must ponder also what will interest our reader and how to make our translation -and, through it- the original acceptable (from the standpoint of both content and form). Most times it is obviously a matter of establishing and average potential reader. Sometimes it is possible - sometimes it is not... it always depends. Even if Gutt was right and we define translation as seconddegree interpretive -as opposed to descriptive- use, how is the translator to decide to go for the one or the other, to “translate” or not? No; I’m afraid that without a proper theory, translation is practically impossible. Now, beautifully written as it is, Théroux’s book is not altogether a literary piece - i.e. neither the readers of the original, nor, presumably, those of a translation will approach it as literature. What counts as relevant interpretive resemblance to The Old Patagonian Express is certainly less problematic than what would count as interpretive resemblance to Childe Harold. So, basically, what we as translators are well advised to do is simply try and place ourselves in Théroux’s shoes, think and feel like him, and try and verbalise what we think so that what we feel adequately transpires in a way that the new readership will relevantly understand. It is indeed easier with Théroux than with Byron, and it is also easier said than done. Indeed, also in documentary translation we must ascertain both what we translate, why we translate it, what we translate it for, for whom we translate, and in what specific situation(s) our translation is going to be read. It is, as I said, a matter of determining an average potential reader. In any event, in this specific case, acceptability ought, in principle, to be as important to the translator as it must have been for Théroux: He would certainly wish to have among his new readers at least the same success that he had with the original ones - and so would the publisher who will have commissioned the translation from us. As it happens, Théroux wrote for readers who mostly knew nothing about South America’s unpredictable and sketchy railroads. This will also apply, say, to his German or Chinese translator; but not to a translator into Spanish: Most of his readers will be familiar with different legs of Théroux’s journey. As a matter of fact, they will be more familiar with those legs than Théroux himself. As an Argentinian, I know what Théroux did not - that there are no volcanoes in our North, and that “the Volcano” is not a mountain but a landslide. Once Théroux’s train puffs across into Tangoland, my hermeneutic package is considerably richer than his (and my northern fellow countrymen’s richer than mine). As an Argentine reader of the original, I am not only

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interested in what Théroux sees of my country (not much that I myself have not seen many more times than he), but also how he sees it, how things that are familiar to me may impress him as bizarre, how his fresh and unprejudiced or differently prejudiced eyes may allow me to see those same old things differently. I read his book as a document, not only as a travel guide. This is what I would want to convey to those Argentine readers who have no access to English. Except that my translation would also be read by Mexicans and Peruvians, whose trains I have never taken, and whose direct vision I cannot compare to Théroux’s. If when re-writing the Argentine leg of his journey, I will be both empathising with and distancing myself from Théroux, when translating Mexico and Peru, I will have no other eyes than his. And the same will presumably happen to most of my readers, at the same or different times and places. So that the expectations that an average Argentine reader will bring to the Argentine leg of the journey will be different from those brought by other Spanish readers and vice versa. My specific problem would be the following: Théroux does not seem to have worried about reflecting in his own translation the dialectal variants of Spanish that he encountered. As a matter of fact, since he did not really know the language, he would have hardly noticed them (as witnessed by the volcano episode). And then, after all, even if he did, how do you have a Mexican from Chiapas and a gaucho from Salta speak different, readily identifiable dialects of English? Moreover, what could possibly be the purpose? Neither Théroux nor his original readers care about these differences - they are not relevant to them, nor is the descriptive resemblance between Théroux’s translated Spanish speech and the original utterances. I, or any other Argentine reader unfamiliar with other Latin American dialects, will not care either in most cases, but not when it comes to my dialect or those that I can identify immediately. I may not know how a Peruvian from Macchu Picchu speaks, except that it must be different from the way I speak, but it would not bother me that he and the Yucatan peasant a few pages before speak alike. But I do know how a salteño speaks, which is different from the way I, a porteño, speak. And any salteño or porteño characters in any book that I read better speak right! When back translating into Spanish, those characters must revert to their dialects. Now in the case of the Argentine folk, I can manage quite well. But what about the other characters? Ideally, the translator should find out each time... and practically? Practically, nothing is practical except practical compromises. But there is no theoretical reason: all those dialects are, in principle, accessible. Now I pause to ask the priests and vestals of pious fidelity to the original: would it not be anathema to make in a translation a distinction that is nowhere made in the original? Would this not be a betrayal of the “document”14? 14

Come to think about it, those Galilean peasants do really sound like they have read the King James, don’t they? I wonder whether Jesus really spoke that funny and how those illiterate shepherds managed to understand him if he did? 242

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On page 163, Théroux translates the words of Don Camilo de Galvar, Visitador General of El Salvador, in 1680: “The people of the pueblos around the lake... Cojutepeques, Texacuangos, and Tepezontes, say that when the earthquakes came from the lake, which they knew by the disappearance of fish, it was a sign that the monster lord of these regions who dwelt in the depths of the lake was eating the fish... The Indians said that the monster only ate fish ‘as men eat fruit, to refresh and allay hunger.’”

How did this sound in that Spanish, then? In order documentary to translate this rather straightforward book into Spanish, a translator must actively master a very wide variety of Spanishes. Can we assert that a translator who does not know Argentine lunfardo, Andalusian caló or the half-Spanish halfEnglish lect that many Hispanic trade in New York does not know Spanish? Not at all: he simply does not know those Spanishes. Will that stand in his professional way? It depends. A New York court interpreter who does not know the Puerto Rican dialect is probably useless for 80% or more of the cases he may be called upon to mediate in. Whoever wants to translate Faulkner or Soyinka better familiarise with other, “non-standard” Englishes. Shakespeare’s English itself is becoming more and more alien to most readers. In other words, García Landa is basically right when he asserts that translation is a language game whose constitutive rule is re-saying in a second speech act, in another language, that which has been said in a first speech act in a first language. He has effectively staked out the province of translation. But once we step into translation’s province, the outer stakes become less relevant: we know what to do in order for a translation to exist. But now we want to know what to do in order for an effective, adequate, relevant or -perish the prescriptive thought!good translation to exist. If all that I have thought of writing here is so, then translating appears as a practically impossible task. Eppur si può!, as Galileo would have mumbled. Because human communication is the production of speech perceptions on the basis of relevance, and so is translation. Indeed, since relevance is ad hoc, every single reader will of necessity lose a different bit each time, but, in the statistical end, none of them will lose too much of what is relevant, and they will all end up reading, say, in Spanish, say, “Théroux’s book.” As they have read the Odyssey, the Rubayat, the United Nations Charter, the Guinness Book of Records and their camcorder’s Owner’s Manual. Because what has been said is never to be mistaken for the words with which it has been said, no matter how beautiful, precise, bizarre or unique. Yes, in some extreme cases, such as lyric poetry or some puns, where how something has been said is a relevant part of what has been said, what has been said cannot be relevantly separated from the words used to convey it, but most of the time it is - otherwise translation would be impossible and we could not claim this Greco-Roman-Judeo culture whose © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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original languages nobody really speaks (they too were countless, and no philologist can tell what the Greek of Syracusan slaves in 400 b. c. really was like). Indeed, the translators who might translate me are countless. And since what has been said can never be spontaneously re-said exactly the same way, each one of them would translate me differently. Some better and some worse, but each one his own way - his own way at that speficic time. Writing, as I said, has fossilised my speech, as it has Théroux’s - or Don Camilo de Galvar’s. Which is why Théroux can re-say in Boston, in his own English, what Don Camilo said in his Spanish in El Salvador back in the XVIIth century, and I could re-say it now in my own English here in Vienna. But neither Théroux in his English nor I in mine -nor anybody else in any language- can say it the same way. Whoever seeks -or, worse, demands- the translation, the absolute translation, the translation before the Almighty, is wasting his time, as does whoever looks at words rather than at sense or mistakes the number of notes for the amount of money, and the latter for the purchased object. Translation as active mediation We now proceed to examine three cases in which, in order to achieve socially acceptable and effective communicative results, it is necessary to depart from prototypical translation. In the following instances, global LPIo/LPCi identity would not socially count as successful communication. The first one is a sign that can -or could, in my time- be seen at the access point to every platform of the New York Bus Terminal: RESTRICTED AREA ONLY TICKETED BUS PASSENGERS ALLOWED BEYOND THIS POINT VIOLATORS WILL BE PROSECUTED [14 words]

Without doing Spanish any violence and taking stock of cultural and other differences between addressees of the original speech act DTo and those of the re-produced act DTi, but retaining, together with the main intention of barring access to the un-ticketed, the secondary intention to intimidate, the most complete LPIo/LPCi identity is perhaps achieved with the following translation: ZONA RESTRINGIDA PROHIBIDO EL ACCESO SIN BILLETE LOS TRANSGRESORES SERÁN PROCESADOS [11 words]

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[RESTRICTED AREA NO ACCESS WITHOUT A TICKET VIOLATORS WILL BE PROSECUTED] [11 words]15

This would be one of several possible prototypical translations. Indeed, in the new speech act faithfully imitates the original one, but that, as we shall see, does not make it functional as a speech act in a typical Spanish-speaking country, and, therefore, for a typical Spanish-speaking public (again, n. b. functional in a given place and time for specific people, not in a given language, language has absolutely nothing to do with it!16) True, the new speech act faithfully matches the original one at the different levels on the left of the model: motivation, intentions and LPIi and FoEnCn. But that is not enough. Stock must be taken of the elements on the right: acceptability and, consequently, the pragmatic effects of comprehension. We shall soon see why. But let me bring in another sign. This time it can be found covering a vast portion of a wall in the luggage room at Fiumicino airport in Rome: AL FINE DI EVITARE SPIACEVOLE DISGUIDI, SI AVVISANO I SIGNORI PASSAGERI CHE POSSONO ESSERE EFFETTUATI CONTROLLI DEGLI SCONTRINI DI IDENTIFICAZIONE DEL BAGAGLIO IN LORO POSSESSO, PER VERIFICARE LA CORRISPONDENZA CON LE ETICHETTE APPOSTE SUI COLLI RITIRATI. [36 words]

It may be difficult to believe, but this is the translation that best reveals the form of the Italian original: IN ORDER TO AVOID UNPLEASANT CARELESSNESS, DISTINGUISHED PASSENGERS ARE INFORMED THAT CONTROLS MAY BE PRACTISED ON THEIR LUGGAGE IDENTIFICATION TAGS, SO AS TO CHECK THAT THEY MATCH LABELS AFFIXED ON THE PIECES THEY ARE TAKING OUT. [36 words]

Once again, a prototypical, stricto sensu translation is non-functional. Let us finally tackle a passage in an owner’s manual for a camcorder. As is usual in

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Note that same number of words occupies considerably more space in Spanish than in English. Is the English translation as long as or shorter than the Spanish? 16

It is normally asserted that English is less prone to florid speech than Spanish or Italian. Both telegraphic Alfred Jingle and torrential Wilkins Micawber speak English. Hemingway does not write more in English than Fielding. Languages are innocent of the way their speakers use them or abuse them. What happens is that sociotextual practices -and with them, acceptability criteria- vary from culture to culture and from time to time. The UN English interpreter who “prunes” a Latin-American delegate’s abundant felicitations is doing nothing but mediating interculturally and seeking to establish relevant LPIo/LPCi identity. © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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these cases, the first pages are devoted to illustrating the advantages of the device, among them: KEEP FOR EVER THE MAGIC MOMENT OF YOUR CHILD’S FIRST ! KEEP AN IMAGE OF YOUR FAVORITE BATTER IN HIS MOMENT OF GLORY! [23 words]

Then come the instructions proper, one of whose sections reads: CHANGING THE FILM CASSETTE IN YOUR HARAKIRI 6000 SUPERCOMPACT ENHANCED IMAGE RECORDER Figure 2: Changing the film cassette In order to change the film cassette in your HARAKIRI 6000 SUPERCOMPACT ENHANCED IMAGE RECORDER press the red button to the right of the cassette enclosure (marked CASSETTE). When the lid has opened, remove the film cassette and replace it. Close the lid by pressing on it until it clicks into place (see figure 2 above on this page). [78 words]

With an identical appellative function, the first example might be translated into Spanish as: RECUERDE PARA SIEMPRE EL PRIMER PASO DE SU HIJO CONSERVE UNA IMAGEN DE SU BATEADOR FAVORITO EN SU MOMENTO DE GLORIA. [21 words]

In the second instance, a prototypical translation that respected the secondary intention to go on selling the camcorder to someone who has already bought it and the motivation of avoiding personal injuries because of insufficient explicitness would give us something like: PARA CAMBIAR EL CASETE DE LA PROCESADORA DE IMÁGENES DE ALTA DEFINICIÓN SUPERCOMPACTA HARAKIRI 6000 Figura 2: Para cambiar el casete Para cambiar el casete de la PROCESADORA DE IMÁGENES DE ALTA DEFINICIÓN SUPERCOMPACTA HARAKIRI 6000, oprimir el botón rojo que se encuentra a la derecha de compartimiento. Luego cerrar la tapa oprimiéndola hasta oírla calzar (Ver figura 2 más arriba). [61 words]

This is an example of the type of moronic instructions that minimally sophisticated Spanish speakers (and every intelligent reader, for that matter) dread. True, the obsession with lawsuits in the US is such that manufacturers will bend backwards in order not to expose themselves to the greed of lawyers arguing the case of users such as the old lady who put her cat to dry in her 246

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microwave oven, ended up without both oven and cat, and sued the manufacturer for a hefty sum, since, indeed, the owner’s manual did not mention that the device was inappropriate for pets. But barring such an overriding selfperpetuation concern, most speakers in most cultures resent excessively moronic instructions. Let us return to our examples: The New York sign could have been signed by Dirty Harry: “RESTRICTED AREA” and “VIOLATORS WILL BE PROSECUTED” are intimidating (they will not be prosecuted, but will simply have to pay a fine). Besides, it is excruciatingly explicit - which makes it irritating for, say, a Spanish reader. The main function of preventing people from gaining access to the platform without a ticket and warning that it cannot be done without retribution, is thus frustrated. With the same intention, an idiomatic Spanish sign opposite the English original, would normally read: ALTO Prohibido pasar sin billete17 EVITE MULTAS [7 words!] [STOP No access without a ticket AVOID FINES] [8 words]

Where “ALTO” serves no other purpose than that functioning as a graphic counterpart to “RESTRICTED AREA” (Em=En), since although helping global LPIo/LPCi identity, with respect to noetic identity proper it is superfluous; so much so that if the sign were not bilingual there would be no reason to add it. As a matter of fact, what really counts in this specific case is that both signs have a similar layout (i.e. that both offer a graphically analogous stimulus of ostensive communication). The semantic form at the top is of no consequence, since it only serves to introduce the noetic substance below. Let us now fly to Fiumicino. Tough Dirty Harry has yielded his place to slimy Don Corleone. We are no longer dared to ‘Make the Transit Authority’s day!’: now the Fiumicino Airport people are telling us ‘You’re a family man. You donna wanna take no luggage that donna belonga to you’ The institutional authors’ pragmatic intention is to have passengers keep their luggage stubs... Except that they never say it for a moment - and it takes them half a wall! The threat, on its part, is veiled: the stubs are not checked to “avoid mistakes” but to dissuade or nab thieves. Such control, in any event, does not prevent mistakes (which will have already been made anyway), but it “remedies” them. But if that 17

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were the real intention, the control would be systematic and not random. What the institutional author wants to convey but never brings himself round to say is, quite simply: KEEP YOUR LUGGAGE STUBS: THEY MAY BE CHECKED [8 words!]

This is due to the fact that what ought to be direct intended sense is transmuted into indirect intended sense to be understood via a cumbersome and unnecessary metarepresentation - a pragmatic no-no if there ever was one in public announcements! On its part, the (approximately) English sign next to the Italian “canonical” verbalization (boldly ignoring the marked Em/En contrast) reads as follows: IN ORDER TO AVOID BAGGAGE MISHANDLING, PASSANGERS ARE REQUESTED TO SHOW THEIR BAGGAGE CLAIMS TAGS FOR CORRESPONDING MATCH WITH LABELS ON COLLECTED LUGGAGES. [23 words]

Obviously, it was written by a non-native speaker (witness the spelling havoc), but his mediating effort in the search for greater relevance by doing away with the obsequious threat is praiseworthy indeed. If the name of the optic relevance game is to cover more wall surface (as it probably is), a better filler could be: DEAR PASSENGERS: PLEASE KEEP YOU LUGGAGE STUBS HANDY, SINCE YOU MAY BE ASKED TO SHOW THEM UPON EXITING THIS ROOM. [20 words]

Which can be telescoped out in various ways, for instance: OUR DISTINGUISHED PASSENGERS ARE KINDLY REQUESTED TO PLEASE KEEP THEIR LUGGAGE STUBS HANDY, SINCE THEY MAY BE ASKED BY OUR STAFF TO PRODUCE THEM UPON EXITING THIS ROOM IN ORDER TO VERIFY THAT THEY MATCH THE ONES ON THEIR LUGGAGE.[40 words]

and so on for as long as there is some wall left to smear. The trick is to talk more without being over moronic or, worse, sleazy - which is exactly what the author of the English translation -a bad translator but a good mediator- had understood, regardless of the original’s moronic sleaziness. The case of the owner’s manual is more illustrative. Two speech acts coexist with a very different function: The first one is unabashedly appellative and has, as its only indirect intended sense “Look what a terrific device!” The mediator who wants to be loyal to his manufacturer client must strive to convey this subtext as effectively as possible - i.e. he must strive to accomplish the 248

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client’s pragmatic intention. In order to do this, however, the decisive criterion is cultural acceptability. Domestic and everyday examples function universally, but as they become culturally more marked, their familiarity -and with it, acceptability- in other cultures decreases; they can even cause irritation (an appellative no-no if there ever was one!). Baseball is not a popular game at all in Europe, Mexico or South America (where most of the potential Spanishspeaking buyers probably are), so the example is not convincing. Unless the circle of potential buyers is restricted to Central America and Cuba, the baseball image, more than inadequate, is parasitic, since it makes the reader uncomfortable: He will feel excluded, un-catered to, as if the instructions did not care about his own habits and preferences. If to that we add the anger at what will probably smack of “Yankee cultural imperialism,” it becomes apparent that the example is counterproductive. In order to overcome this obstacle it is necessary to change games and switch immediately to real football. But this decision entails several others: It is not enough to transmute the batter into a centre forward and say “Keep an image of your favourite centre forward in his moment of glory!” In football the specific manoeuvre counts more than the players involved; it is better to shift focus, for instance: KEEP FOREVER THAT FANTASTIC MID-FIELD GOAL! [7 words]

(Always looking for the terminology more immediately acceptable to most, if not all, potential readers). If the owner’s manual is also addressed to Central America and the Caribbean, then, of course, baseball recovers part of its relevance and it is better to add it. As this trivial example clearly shows, the only way to hit the nail on its functional head is by knowing or adequately establishing the new readership’s cultural specificity and, especially, acceptability criteria. In this case, what is necessary is to be aware a) that the new readership do not play baseball, b) that, in certain countries and social strata, baseball carries a whole series of uncomfortable social, economic, political and geopolitical connotations, c) that baseball and football are played and, therefore, judged very differently: in baseball each batter is alone on the spot at a specific time facing every member of the rival team, whereas football is a choreographic battle of 22 players that lack such a clear-cut opportunity to shine exclusively as individuals. Again, none of these pieces of knowledge has anything to do with linguistic or rhetoric competence: they are strictly cultural (and, as a matter of fact, cut across what we call the English or Spanish languages). Indeed, perhaps women (translators or readers) will be less aware of these sportive facts than men. Be that as it may, up to this point the mediator has translated “on behalf of the manufacturer” (i.e., in the way that best serves the latter’s conscious aims). The second speech act, instead, jumbles the appellative, conative and expressive functions, and they are not equally relevant for the reader. Even if the manufacturer cannot fathom it, it is no longer a matter of the text’s effectiveness © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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for its author, but of its usefulness for the addressee. The instructions are for him -as a matter of fact, they are his- so that the exasperating appellative/expressive function is totally out of place. There is a total mismatch between WZ > Yy and UZ  Aa, i.e. between functionality for the author and for the reader. On the other hand, as I was saying, the delirious explicitness of American instructions is due basically to two factors, one economical and the other one sociological: As I have mentioned, the lawsuit industry literally scares the rhetorical wits out of manufacturers and service providers. Also, the American consumer public includes people of very humble origins and scant education which would never be part of the intended readership in any Third World country or even in Spain. In the Hispanic market (both Latin American and Iberian) neither condition obtains, and with them also is gone the need for the over explicative explicature. If (always out of loyalty to the manufacturer) what matters is to teach the addressee how to use his device, the mediator must, in principle, put himself decidedly in the latter’s shoes and get rid of all the chaff so as to let the wheat shine through, taking advantage, besides, of the redundancy between Fo(SmH) and E. The main element to be taken into account in order to determine an adequate degree of explicitness for his instructions is the intellectual acumen of the potential readers (will the text be read, for instance, by children, or foreigners, or not very sophisticated native speakers). The semantic and syntactic structure will depend on local use. For instance, in Spain, public announcements tend to use the formal second-person plural imperative: “No se apoyen contra la puerta” [do not lean on the door], whereas in the River Plate that form is completely unusual and, therefore, heavily marked. There, use oscillates between the first-person singular imperative: “No se apoye contra la puerta” and the infinitive: “No apoyarse contra la puerta” (“do not lean on the door”/ “no leaning on the door”). Depending on local use, a button is “apretado,” “oprimido,” or “aplastado” (that I know of, only in Ecuador), and a “casete” can be either feminine or masculine. All these possibilities are shuffled according to the crucial acceptability of the new speech act in the new situation and for the new readership. Acceptability, this time around, is a strict function of practical relevance: most clarity with fewest words. As with the previous case, as the potential readership expands, more concessions must be made and compromises accepted: it becomes less a matter of acceptability than of least resistance - and, above all, fewer misunderstandings. I venture the following version: PARA CAMBIAR EL CASETE (Figura 2) Para cambiar el casete oprimir el botón rojo (a la derecha del compartimiento). Luego cerrar bien la tapa (figura 2). [20 words!] [CHANGING THE CASSETTE - (Figure 2) - To change the cassette push the red button (to the left of the enclosure). Then close the lid.] [18 words]

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What have I done? Mediate actively. I have chosen to glide along the space separating the writer’s lips from the reader’s ears, modifying (or ignoring) one or the other as a function of my own skopos which is achieving not so much absolute LPIo/LPCi identity, but relevant identity (for the manufacturer and/or the reader and/or, if neither, the originator of the translation). Naturally, very often the skopos is forced upon the mediator. The originator, who pays the piper, is also prone to call the tune -the wrong tune more often than not- and impose what, from a strictly communicative standpoint, are but arbitrary, even illadvised constraints. As a case in point, my manufacturer client insisted that I mention the product’s name at least once per page - which is still less of an overkill than once per line. My argument was that the poor addressee has already bought the blasted camcorder and that he doesn’t need the manufacturer to keep telling him what a terrific buy it is. All he wants now is to learn how to use his gadget, and anything standing in his way is bound to ruffle his feathers the wrong way. Moreover, the manufacturer also has a vested interest in the user learning to use his camcorder adequately: He does not wish to have to make good on his warranty! In fact, a professional mediator simply must know best what either the client or the translation user wants and have the deontological duty to voice and defend his expert opinion. Whether to any avail, though, is a completely different story! The phenomenon necessitating the mediator to place himself closer to the translation readership in order to ensure optimum relevance for his speech act in the target culture is that, due to displaced situationality, the asymmetry between the writer’s willingness and ability to make himself understood and the translation readership’s willingness and ability to understand has become even more marked. This, as we can clearly see, is why any translator cannot but be an interlingual and intercultural mediator, whose job it is to ensure, insofar as professionally possible, whatever kind of LPIo/LPCi identity may be considered relevant under the circumstances. The “liberties” a mediator takes, therefore, he takes because he is a human being involved in talking, and not a computer that is fed a code through its keys and evinces another one on its screen or, less extremely, understanding what is being said in a language and noncommittally reverbalising it in another, regardless of the social consequences of his choices. In this liberty lies the creative nature of his job. The translator, as has been repeatedly asserted, does not “find” equivalences: he “creates” them, i.e. he comes up each time with a verbalisation, an FiCnEn, that is the unique, ad hoc product both of his comprehension and of his assessment of the new situational parameters and what now counts as relevant LPIo/LPCi identity. This assessment may lead him to alter radically even the very motivation and intentions behind and functionality of the original Do. More radically, this assessment may lead him to modify the LP, so that, in the end, there is no LPIo/LPCi identity.

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In the case of the owner’s manual, the mediator has appointed himself sociologist, communication expert and market analyst all in one underpaid self. There are very few occasions when this kind of knowledge and analysis of pragmatic and other “extranoetic” (not to mention extralinguistic, let alone extrasemantic) factors becomes indispensable for an effective mediation of the most pedestrian instrumental texts, the decisive criterion for which is acceptability as a direct function of relevance. By the way, acceptability is closely linked to intertextuality (itself a token of relevant sociotextual practices), i.e. to the more habitual models among potential readers (be it of laws, advertisements, owner’s manuals, obituaries or even sonnets). This does not mean that the mediator must necessarily follow any pre-existent model(s), but in order adequately to depart from a model it is best to know it well: Picasso did not paint square faces because he was unable to draw any round ones. Ultimately, what counts is that, in many instances, the mediator, in order to compatibilise the speaker’s motivation and intention and the new interlocutor’s interest and ability (which are, precisely, the elements he is less likely to be able to control or influence), has no choice but to try and chisel both his own LPIi and the criteria for verbalising it. In this lies his expertise as a mediator. His specifically translational worth will only shine through his comprehension of an LPIo and the adequateness of the FiCnEn whereby he will verbalise his own LPIo. This bare mediation is generally typical of instrumental translations (and interpretations) where, by definition, the original speech act loses all of its relevance, even in the case of the multilingual brochures in ten different languages that come with electronic devices sold in Europe (no user compares them or even tell which one is the original). In this kind of instrumental speech acts, language use is basically descriptive: LPCi cohesion matters more than LPIo/LPCi identity. Of course, whenever the original brochure becomes a legal issue in a court of law, its use ceases to be descriptive (the mediator called upon to translate it does not show how to use the device, but how the speaker says that it must be used - which is, by the way, what I have done in the initial, semantic translations of all these examples). The difference between instrumental and documentary translation is a fundamental difference in relevant identity. In the case of instrumental translations, the original is not considered to be a canonical verbalisation of an LPI (the different versions of an international treaty or of an owner’s manual are all instrumental). In documentary translation, instead, the original is judged to be the canonical verbalisation of an LPI, so that the new verbalisations strive both for LPIo/LPCi identity and maximum or optimum similarity or equivalence between Fo and Fi compatible with such identity. Documentary translation, which is always subject to LPIo/LPCi identity is not to be confused with literal translation, whose main, and sometimes only, purpose is to achieve Fo/Fi similarity even at the expense of LPIo/LPCi identity.

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The speech act’s explicature, then, consists of a linguistic and an extralinguistic explicature, the former pragmatically and often semantically subordinated to the latter. The consequences are obvious: Fo/Fi equivalence or similarity is immediately subordinated to combined FoCmEm/FiCnEn similarity or equivalence, and the latter, in turn, to LPIo/LPCI identity. The model allows for the passage of elements from linguistic to extralinguistic explicature and vice versa. In the example of the camcorder manual, the image of the device with its lid and red button makes the descriptive part of the linguistic explicature (“the red button to the right of the lid marked ‘cassette’”) redundant. In this particular instance, the principle of relevance renders unnecessary, and therefore parasitic, any effort to bear out linguistically a perfectly clear image. So that, despite an enormous semantic “loss” between Fo(SmH) and Fi(SnH) in my suggested translation, there is no relevant information loss at all, since respectively, the combined FoEm/FiEn explicatures are equally informative - except that FiEn is much simpler and, besides, takes up less space. In this text, the mediator has operated three qualitatively different modifications due to diverse factors: 1) The suppression of FoEm redundancy is due to informative rather than pragmatic considerations: FiEn produces the same relevant contextual effects with less processing effort, but FoEm and FiEn are equally informative. 2) The suppression of information that the reader can easily infer on the basis of his relevant knowledge (the reader knows that the lid will not have closed properly unless it makes a “click” sound). In this respect, FiEn is not less informative than FoEm but less situationally redundant. 3) The suppression or attenuation of the appellative/expressive function, instead, is more a pragmatic than an informative move. For the user, who needs an exclusively informative and conative text that explains what and tells him how, the appellative and expressive functions are totally irrelevant and out of place: they distract and irritate him. It is not just a matter of increasing the text’s informative/conative relevance, but of making it more acceptable. In this respect FiEn totally or partially discards the “information” that is deemed to be irrelevant for the reader. We had also seen how in the New York sign, semantically unnecessary “ALTO” had no other function than providing optical asymmetry between Em and En, since the absence of a graphic counterpart to “RESTRICTED AREA” could puzzle the reader who might wonder why the English sign is “sterner” than the Spanish one. This puzzlement, by the way, by increasing processing effort conspires against relevance. The incorporation of these extralinguistic elements that invariably accompany oral or written speech greatly simplifies, as we can see, the theoretical modelling of constrained translation in all its variants: dubbing, subtitling, voice over, opera libretti, simultaneous interpreting, etc. In subtitling, of DVo:Fo(XmL,SmH,VmR,Jm)CmEm, only that part of SmH is “transferred” to DTi that is not contextually redundant with CmEm (which, of course, does not

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change). This explains that even though the semantic load of Fi is drastically reduced, there normally is no great loss of relevant LPIo/LPCi identity. The incorporation of the extralinguistic explicature, besides, helps understand the difficulties of machine translation, which is incapable of perceiving it and taking it into consideration, let alone taking advantage of it. Machine translation is viable only insofar as the linguistic explicature recoding in its morphosyntactic and semantic components are enough to make it possible for the reader relevantly to infer the LPI, This entails, on the one hand, a rather infrequent read “antinatural”- isomorphism between propositional content and Fo syntactic and semantic structure, and an equally antinatural additional effort on the part of the reader. The computer limits itself to convert Fo(XmL,SmH) into Fi(XnL,SnH), all the other elements escape it. Orality versus textuality While walking down a street a man sees a funeral party coming out of a house on the opposite side. He runs across and embraces one of the four men carrying the coffin: -Kowalslki! You’re as young as ever! You haven’t changed one bit, you son of a bitch! How are you after such a long time!’ -Sorry sir, but… -Don’t you recognise me? Petorutti! Fifth class, St. Peter’s High School! It figures: I’ve become bald and put on a lot of weight… but you… haven’t changed one bit, you bastard! Let’s go for a drink and talk! We have so much to tell to each other! -Oh, right; sorry Petorutti, I didn’t recognise you! But then, you know, at this time…! -Gee, I’m an ass! Sorry, my friend, but you know, I was so glad to see you…! But, wait a sec, whom are you burying? -My wife! -You got married!

The joke’s effectiveness depends, above all, on the reader not feeling offended (in his not opposing a resistance preventing him from perceiving any fun, for instance if he thinks that black humour is in bad taste). Barring this ideological and emotive hurdle, fun will depend on how the reader imagines the scene and, especially, on how he sees and hears Petorutti utter his Fo ‘You got married!,’ since the LPIo is configured paralinguistically and kinetically - so much so that there is no need for Kowalski to say anything: his distressed countenance and bent head are enough. In the text I have provided no semantic clue, limiting myself to the only thing that English writing affords me to indicate C: exclamation and interrogation marks, which are identical for Petorutti’s booming bass and Kowalski’s heartbroken tenor. I have not had Petorutti exult or Kowalski whine. Nor have I said that Petorutti was almost yelling while Kowalski’s voice was faint. I trusted you to imagine the situation in all its relevant details, including Kowalski’s embarrassed befuddlement as he was being profusely embraced under the coffin. Of course, the semantic clues would 254

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have helped you visualise the situation much more directly and graphically. A richer and more precise semantic representation, that is, would have allowed the passage to the imaginary first-degree perception to be more effortless and immediate - which would have increased the qualitative effects of comprehension. In other words, I could have told the joke better. Now, in an oral act, the effect would have depended almost exclusively in my histrionic prowess, i.e. not so much on the semantic representation I would produce with my Fo as of my ability to imitate the characters’ speech and gestures: If I fail to get excited as Petorutti or distraught as Kowalski, the joke looses all its punch, in that case, without an additional effort to cancel my own stimulus an interlocutor cannot imagine a situation that no longer is much richer than, but different from the one he is actually seeing. Being funny at telling jokes does not depend only on the ability linguistically to verbalise an LPIo - and the same goes for being effective at reciting poetry. Indeed, if anybody can talk, not anybody can be a good actor or even a good speaker. This is, most probably, the basic difference between written and oral speech, in which an utterance is a component set among all the other components of live communication, where linguistic, paralinguistic and kinetic stimuli by all interlocutors, the shared time/space co-ordinates, the constant verification of the effectiveness whereby intentions to make understand and understand are materialised determine not only the different stages of LPIs’ verbalisation but their very conception. As they speak and understand, interlocutors adapt to the social situation dynamics. The advantage and disadvantage of writing is, precisely, its indeterminacy vis-à-vis paralinguistics and kinetics, and, more generally, the fact that a firstdegree perception is transmuted into a semantic representation, which forces the interlocutor to imagine what he sees, hears, touches, tastes and smells. This indeterminacy of second-degree perceptions becomes irrelevant when the firstdegree perception is there too. And, barring direct speech, nowhere is it more “there” than in movies or, to a lesser degree, comics. Let us thus tread upon this hybrid ground. Hybrid forms Translation for performance on the stage or the screen As Bassnett points out, there is a difference between translating plays as texts to be read and translating them for the stage: “[E]ven the most superficial consideration of the question must show that the dramatic text cannot be translated in the same way as the prose text. To begin with a theatre text is read differently. It is read as something incomplete, rather than as a fully rounded unit, since it is only in performance that the full potential of the text is realized. And this presents the translator with a central problem: whether to translate the text as a purely literary text, or to try to translate in its function as one element in another, more complex system… It

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is impossible to separate text from performance, since theatre consists of the dialectical relationship between both… A notion of theatre that does not see written text and performance as indissolubly linked, then, will inevitably lead to discrimination against anyone who appears to offend against the purity of the written text” (1988:119-120).

Later on, quoting Veltrusky, she pointedly adds: “The relationship between dialogue and the extralinguistic situation is intense and reciprocal. The situation often provides the dialogue with its subject matter. Moreover, whatever the subject matter may be, the situation variously interferes in the dialogue, affects the way it unfolds… The actual sense of the individual units of meaning depends as much on the extra-linguistic situation as on the linguistic context” (íbid.:121).

Indeed, translation for the stage presupposes a keen awareness of C and E. Often, stage directors or actors themselves modify lines in order for words better to fit action, rather than the other way around. Here, a keen stage director or actor will normally seek deeply into a character’s unconscious, and then into its motivations and intentions as it speaks or understands. Translation for the stage tends to call for active and often overt mediation - especially when the piece is set at a different time and place or is adapted for television or the movies. At times the resources available call for radical cuts or even reduction of characters. Spanish writer Eduardo Mendoza was once asked to translate Shakespeare’s Caesar and Cleopatra so that it could be performed by just six actors. Sir Lawrence Olivier’s Hamlet has several scenes missing from Grigory Kosintsev’s Russian version based on Pasternak’s translation, whilst the great Russian director’s Don Quijote condensed Cervantes’s two volumes into 90 minutes of images and perhaps less than 60 of text - all of it dialogue. Boito’s adaptation of Othello for Verdi does blithely away with the first half of the Shakespearean original, besides boldly manipulating what is left (and, Heaven forgive me, but as drama, both his Otello and Falstaff work much better than the Bard’s, as do Orson Welles’s own Othello and composite Falstaff). The different Spanish versions of My Fair Lady, moreover, had Eliza Doolitle and her fellow Cockney folk speak locally identifiable sociolects -as well, indeed, as Professor Higgins, Pickering and the rest of the upper class characters- and had all the scenes in which Professor Higgins strives to teach his pupil “proper” pronunciation adapted accordingly18. From the standpoint of a theory of interlingual mediation, I submit, what counts is the final Fi that reaches the 18

In the staging I saw in Buenos Aires in the 60’s, “The rain in Spain falls mainly on the plain” became “El rey que hay en Madrid se fue a Aranjuez” [the king who is in Madrid left for Aranjuez], with poor Eliza trying to pronounce the final /d/ of Madrid and the interdental /z/ of Aranjuez – except that none of the Argentine actors would pronounce that /z/ anywhere else in the play. Obviously, the translation had been meant for performance in Spain rather than Argentina. 256

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audience - regardless of the number and role of the hands mediating between the original and the piece as staged. In any event -whether successfully or not- what all these mediators (translators, directors, adapters, etc.) have sought is relevant identity between meaning as originally meant and as finally understood, with an active manipulation based on their own motivations and intentions, and, at times, an intentional deviation from those they themselves attributed to the original. Let us take a look at a practical example. In Macbeth, Act II, Scene I, Lennox and Macduff knock at dawn at the Thane’ s castle. After their exchange with the hilarious porter, enters Macbeth, who has just murdered King Duncan. Upon learning that the King is bent on leaving that morning, Lennox ejaculates: The night has been unruly: where we lay Our chimneys were blown, and, as they say, Lamentings herd i’ the air; strange screams of death; And prophesying, with accents terrible, Of dire combustion and confus’d events, New hatch’d to the woeful time: the obscure bird Clamour’d the live-long night: some say the earth Was feverous, and did shake.

To which Macbeth replies: ’Twas a rough night.

I had always interpreted Macbeth’s synthesis of Lennox description as a grave and rotund D minor cord. This is also the way I had actually heard it in performance (notably in Roman Polanski’s splendid film) until Christopher Plummer took me completely by surprise a few years ago in New York. His was a gesture of irritation, mockery and contempt - a bit like the “more matter with less art” with which Gertrude tries to stop short Polonius’ verbosity. The English utterance bears naturally both indirect intended senses - as well as, many others: there is simply no way to rearrange those four words, save, perhaps, “A rough night it was.” Be that as it may, Shakespeare’s Macbeth went for “‘Twas a rough night” and that’s that. Spanish, however, offers a choice syntactically to foreground either night or rough, and depending on the indirect intended sense -mainly conveyed by voice and posture- one works better than the other. Thus the translator, the director or the actor would have to choose between Fue una dura noche / Fue una noche dura.

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the way I would translate it and play it. Whilst the original gives no clue as to how the reader is to interpret Macbeth’s indirect intended sense, Spanish forces the translator to choose to give rise more easily to one set of weak implicatures rather than to another. What is interesting in this case is that the choice becomes relevant only in actual performance, depending on how the words are to be uttered - C and E end up determinining F. Film translation Of all the kinds of constrained translation, the translation of films (dubbing, subtitling and voice over) is the one in which F, C, and E are most imbricate. The important thing for translation is that the LPIi is decisively buttressed by the image, which reduces the need to semantise it in Fi. Some jokes -such as the one above- can be subtitled in the most succinct and pedestrian manner: the humour shines through the scenic movement and the actor’s histrionics. In dubbing, voice quality and paralinguistics are sometimes more important than what they help utter. The counterpart lies in the severe space/time constraints for subtitling, and lip-movement/time for dubbing. Voice-over narration, on its part, is only time-constrained, although, the quality of the faceless voice becomes a decisive acceptability factor. Subtitling offers the most interesting possibility of textualising orality, where there is no displaced situationality between DVo and DTi - even though it does obtain between DVo/DTi production and the successive perceptions, with the concomitant modification in the situation and all its formants. We have here a paradoxical inversion of the situations typical for oral and written speech. Indeed, by freezing oral speech, it becomes possible to isolate the poles of production and comprehension - a feature hitherto confined mostly to written speech. Dubbing is, in a way, the most constrained form of all, since it has the inescapable constraint of lip synchronisation, which limits the number of phonemes that can appear to be pronounced and, to boot, imposes its own rhythm and pauses, to which the character’s kinetics is added (that “Aquí!” that the actor proffers pointing at a precise spot must coincide with the dubbed “Here!” or “Look!”). On the other hand, it poses problems akin to literary translation in that it may be called upon to reproduce the idiosyncrasy of a character’s speech (especially with respect to its social and geographic origin). One of the most endearing features of the old British series The Persuaders was the abyss between the accents and registers of Tony Curtis, the self-made millionaire Danny Wild, born in the Brooklyn slums, and Roger Moore, that most polished Lord Sinclair. But how could it have been preserved in Spanish? By turning Curtis into a low class Caracan and Moore into an aristocratic Madrileño? Here not even the approach that works with My Fair Lady would be of any avail: different socioloects of the same vernacular will not do - much less in subtitling, where all differences in accent are irreparably lost. And yet, as the success of these and so many other TV series or films subtitled or dubbed into countless languages show, relevant LPIo/LPCi identity is still very much possible. The reason is that the difference makes relevant 258

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sense only within Fo. There is simply no way to differentiate American and Queen’s English in Spanish or any other language - let alone while respecting lip synch! The lectal parlance cannot be perceived in translation (and whatever cannot be perceived is, by definition, untranslatable). Since in performance F is only one component of the total stimulus, however, this indisputable loss is not all that relevant in the end: Curtis dresses, gesticulates and in general behaves like a wealthy plebeian, contrasting with Moore’s obvious, subdued and glacial demeanour - and that is indeed most clearly perceived. In the dubbed version, a noticeable difference in accents would have probably been but an additional detail - and an obtrusive one at that. Not so in the original, of course. For the listeners/viewers of the original such difference is crucial: it’s absence would have been sorely felt as a shortcoming, as a lack of verisimilitude. The Spanish listener/viewer, instead, is perfectly willing to accept that the characters (American and British, but also French, Spanish or Italian, since each episode takes place in at least one different European country) all speak the same French or Spanish language. Suspension of disbelief is part and parcel of acceptability for any addressee of any kind of translation or dubbing (only in consecutive -and to a lesser degree simultaneous- interpretation are two voices and two speeches clearly perceived19). But the spectator of the original is not psychologically ready to accept that Wild does not speak like Curtis or Sinclair like Moore - and they would not take any other voices either! Thus dubbing is accepted into another language, but not into the same language (and how does it bother when it is evident that the comedians have dubbed themselves afterward!). Not only because the voice may not be the expected one (only the stars’ voices are really familiar), but because of the lack of lip synch, which in a good dubbing into a foreign language goes almost unperceived due to the much greater tolerance20. A 19

Well, not quite: I have seen movies with a mixture of dubbing and voice over above an audible original soundtrack - a most excruciating experience! 20

An issue to be explored is the tolerance threshold in the case of an interpreter’s accent. In international organisations, there seems to be a remarkable tolerance in certain languages (Arabic or Chinese, for instance), since in most cases the audience is used to the fact that interpretation comes invariably out of nonnative lips. But I doubt that a French delegate who would have no problems accepting an obvious Chinese accent in the interpreter from Chinese would not wince at it if the interpretation were from English, or even if the accent were indeed English. Another issue to be researched is that of native accents that in certain international contexts are deemed to be too marked to be acceptable (viz. the “colonial” accents in the English and French booths). I am told that many Iberian delegates at European institutions also wince at “colonial” accents, for the simple reason that they believe that the European interpretation market for the Spanish booth should be reserved to Spaniards. But this is a socially different case, since after almost two centuries of independence and with Spain having lost its metropolitan glitz, our accents are no longer patronised. For reasons half cultural but also half political, Chinese delegates from the People’s Republic have their hair standing on end when they hear a Taiwanese or other extra-continental accent in the booth (and not so long ago, also an accent from Hong Kong). This tolerance threshold is considered © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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special case is that of re-dubbing. As I was working on this chapter, I saw a British-Argentine co-production, Of Love and Shadows, with Jennifer Canaille and Antonio Banderas, a cast of Argentine actors and one Chilean, Patricio Contreras. All the non-native speakers were dubbed into English. Now the version I saw had been re-dubbed into Iberian Spanish. As an Argentinean I knew all the main characters’ voices. I am also closely familiar with the Chilean accent. So you can imagine how much disturbed I was to see those familiar Argentine faces playing Chilean characters and speaking Iberian Spanish. I wonder what the effect would be on a Chilean audience! In order to have an idea of this qualium, picture a film where you see Lawrence Olivier, Maggie Smith and John Gielgud playing Australians and speaking with voices other than their own with a Caribbean lilt. Tough sell, right? The original speeches by Curtis and Moore -in a manner paralleling in some ways Eliza Doolitle’s and Professor Higgings’s- differ at several levels that are equally relevant to a listener/viewer of the original: Linguistically, there are phonomorphosyntactic, semantic, prosodic and register marks, but there are paralinguistic marks as well, since their voices are so familiar. All this disappears in dubbing. Only the actors’ bodies, gestures and movements remain; yet they are enough to ensure relevant identity between what each of them individually and each episode as a whole mean to convey and what the foreign audience perceive. This is not the case, however, with Curtis’s hilarious imitation of Cary Grant’s debonair, subdued British accent and lexical choices in Billy Wilder’s Some Like It Hot (and if you missed this subtle characterisation altogether, may I encourage you to see the film again!). The basic criterion of theatre and film translation, as that of media interpreting, is, of course, immediate, on line acceptability. Comedy must provoke laughter, drama must move, etc. Needless to point out the kinds of liberties that this mountain of restrictions necessitates (dialectics will be dialectics). But what remains nonnegotiable throughout in the end is relevant LPIo/LPCi identity, which is the only criterion that allows us to assert that the movie’s dubbing or subtitling are relevant translations - unlike Woody Allen’s What’s Up, Tiger Lily, a Japanese thriller hilariously “subtitled” in English with no relation whatsoever to what the characters are really saying21. An informal tour of the thorny issue of the unit of translation In SI the unit of translation coincides almost invariably with the unit of sense, which in turn coincides with the unit of transfer. The same applies in most translations of pragmatic texts, which explains the fact that most professional to be so important that in many interpretation schools more audibly “ethnic” students are encouraged to adopt more “neutral” accents. 21

A most interesting intermediate monster is due to censorship: Hitchkock’s Notorious was initially dubbed into German with the nasty nazis turned simple drug smugglers and all relevant references cut or changed. 260

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translators -including, when nobody is looking, those of us who teach translation- do not read the whole text before setting out to translate: they read as they translate, leaving details and subtleties to later readings. This coincidence of unit of transfer -the unit with which translators and interpreters effectively operate, which can be stored in medium-term memory- and unit of translation -a higher-level notion than the different correspondences that can (and/or must) obtain between an original and its translation- has wreaked havoc among theoreticians (translators and interpreters could not care less). The unit of translation is, by definition, a post mortem finding, as seen in the intricate system devised by Spanish “translemists” (Rabadán 1991a and b, and 1994). This fact becomes much more apparent, as we shall see, in literary translation, in which propositional content is most chaotically manipulated, becoming displaced, dismembered, shrunk, stretched or deformed in a thousand ways in order to adapt itself to the formal constraints with a view ultimately to achieve relevant LPIo/LPCi identity. This has led many to assert that the unit of translation is the text itself - which is as true as it is useless. I think that it is best to divide the notion into unit of sense, unit of transfer and unit of translation proper. The first is the basic “chunk” of F the processing of which produces an LP. The second would be a “chunk” of Fo that more or less lends itself to be modularly reverbalised as an equivalent segment in the translated text, whilst the latter would be a larger unit inside which the translator shuffles units of transfer, introduces compensations, and otherwise reorganises semantic and other material. In the case of the different translations of Eugene Oneguin that we shall analyse in the last chapter, translators have taken the line as basic unit of transfer and the strophe as unit of translation. It is not surprising that line-to-line transfer is not all too efficient (as modularity itself is not, whatever the text, since there is no isomorphism between the language of thought and natural languages, i.e. between LPI and o or i). Semantic and other elements become displaced and reorganised, but lines remain, nevertheless, ostensibly parallel. Strophes, instead, are perfectly tight compartments. The problem with the unit of translation (and even with the unit of transfer) appears when it comes to “suprasegmental” ingredients such as tone, register and, generally, style, which cannot be easily attributed to this or that phonomorpohosyntactic or semantic unit or articulation of units of sense. We have already seen it with the goggles advertisement (a case akin to literary translation, since the specific importance of noetic content is less than in purely informative texts). What kind of “units” are Moore and Curtis’ sociolects or Poirot’s French accent, of transfer or of translation? Indeed, they must be taken into account and, if possible, kept in the translated texts, but I do not think that, unlike propositional content, they can be treated as units that can be modularly “deconstructed.” They are, I repeat, suprasegmental: they impregnate an utterance or series of utterances as a whole. In this respect, I deem it advisable to analyse them in the light of the contextual

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effects they produce. Noetic content produces, by definition, cognitive effects (which, in turn, give rise to qualitative aftershocks), whilst the effects of suprasegmental components are essentially qualitative. If we lose sight of this distinction, unit of sense, unit of transfer and unit of translation become tangled. Units of sense and transfer are strictly propositional and presuppose modularity, since the first ones are perceived synapsis by synapsis and the second ones must be obtained by segmenting the original in order to transpose it, as it were, into a segment of the translated text. The unit of transfer is thus assimilated to the unit of sense, although they do not completely coincide (as when semes travel from a specific unit of sense in the original to a different one in the translation or become lost along the way). The unit of translation has a purpose that goes beyond propositional identity and lends itself less to modularization. In both cases, though, we are speaking about attributes of Fo and Fi, i.e. of formal units. Since mediation is wider than translation, from this more general angle, the theoretical value of all three units becomes, needless to point out, somewhat diminished. This is all I have to say. I hope that it helps clarifying these notions and advance the discussion.

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CHAPTER VI THE PUDDING OF THE PROOF: LITERARY MEDIATION “C’est là véritablement ‘traduire’, qui est de reconstituer au plus près l’effet’ d’une certaine cause...” Paul Valéry, Prologue to the Cantiques spirituels. [What translation really is, is reconstructing as close as possible the effect of a certain cause.] “It may be tautological to claim that artistic translation exists when, and only when, the translator brings the same art to he translation process as the earlier artist brought to the source text,” Willis Barnstone, The Poetics of Translation. History Theory and Practice, p. 47. “What is meant by objective translation criticism? In the present context objectivity means to be verifiable as in contrast to arbitrary or inadequate. This means that every criticism of a translation, whether positive or negative, must be defined explicitly and be verified by examples. The critic should also always make allowance for other subjective options. In negative criticism the critic should try and ascertain what led the translator to make the (alleged) error. On the one hand this process opens an opportunity for examining the background of the passage... On the other hand it can be beneficial for the critic, sometimes revealing an insight that was overlooked in an initial adverse judgement. In any event, the critic’s reader is given an opportunity of considering two different judgements and of weighing their respective probability and value afresh. [In] constructive translation criticism there is the challenge of offering counterproposals for rejected solutions. A comparison with the original offers the critic’s reader an opportunity of choosing between different equivalents,” Katharina Reiss, Translation Criticism - The Potentials and Limitations, pp. 4-5.

Literary speech If a theory and model of translation are but a corollary of a theory of speech, it is obvious that a theory and model specific to literary translation presuppose a theory and model of literary speech, based, in turn, on a theory and model of the literary aesthetic experience. The latter, unfortunately, I do not have, nor does anybody else that I have read, except for Bakhtin’s pioneer works and a most relevant stab by Pilkington (2000). This is an objective limitation of our knowledge about the aesthetic effects produced on each individual by processing first- and second-degree perceptions, and about the mechanisms that trigger

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them1. One thing, though, seems evident to me: Whatever the features distinguishing literary speech from all other forms of speech, it will still be a speech modality governed by the general rules governing every other form of speech. Literary-speech comprehension itself, therefore, must be also defined as relevant identity between what the speaker (novelist, poet, playwright, humorist, etc.) means to convey and what the subject of comprehension (reader, critic, translator) understands, i.e. between LPIo and LPCo, the specific difference being in this case that relevance is defined first and foremost aesthetically. So that homoscopic, homofunctional translation of literary speech -i.e. literary translation proper- is also to pursue and achieve such aesthetically relevant identity between what the original speaker (presumably) means to convey and what the reader of the translated text understands, i.e. between LPIo and LPCi. My argument, following García Landa, is that the linguistic articulation of an LP2 is its variable form. Earlier I invoked as an example Archimedes’s principle, the verbalisation of which can vary without changing an iota the noetic content that it is reduced to. In any language there are, indeed, countless possible verbalisations of such noetic content, more or less succinct, more or less clear, more or less terminologically precise, in all possible registers, and even with rhyme and metre. Yet, insofar as that noetic content remains intact, all these formulations express the same principle. Does it mean, then, that the specific verbalisation of the principle does not matter? It depends, as we have seen, on the purpose that whoever utters -or bothers to try and understand- the principle in a specific speech act may have, i.e. on the effects that he seeks which is to say on the interplay between W/Yy and Aa. In any event, the aesthetic attributes (viz. the euphony of enunciation) will hardly be relevant aspects of the speech act, since a scientific principle will seldom be verbalised in order to move with the pulse of elocution, to attack reason through the flank of aesthetic sensitivity (even though it is always possible). Acts of literary speech (and many others the production and translation of which abut on literature), of course, are a different kettle of fish. Aesthetic functionality is, precisely, what distinguishes literary speech from all others. Literary speech may, therefore, be ostensively informative, but it is always openly or covertly expressive and metalinguistic, and what distinguishes such expressiveness is the aesthetic sensitivity (it may be intentional or not) informing and motivating the speech act. As Bakhtin puts it so clearly: “...Poetry uses technically linguistic language in a special way: language is necessary to it in its entirety, multilaterally and in all its aspects; poetry is not 1

See Ramachandran and Hirstein (1999) for a most interesting analysis of the reactions that may explain neurologically the aesthetic effects of first-degree perceptions. 2

Complemented, of course, by the paralinguistic and kinetic components; but for the purposes of my analysis I think it best to leave them aside, even though there are cases in which C and E play a decisive role, as in St. Exupéry’s Le petit prince or Apolinnaire’s Caligrammes. 264

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indifferent to a single feature of the linguistic word [emphasis in the original, SV]. Except for poetry, none of the cultural spheres needs language in its totality: knowledge does not need at all the complex peculiarity of the word’s acoustic aspect..., etc...[Other spheres] cannot avoid language, but they take very little from it... Only in poetry does language fully reveal its possibilities, since the demands it faces here are maximum: all its facets are stressed in the extreme and reach their ultimate limits; it is as if poetry extracted from it all its juice, so that language thus transcends itself. Yet, even though it is so demanding with respect to language, poetry nevertheless transcends it as language, as linguistic determination... [As in all the arts,] the extra-aesthetic nature [acoustic sound, dynamics, etc.] of the material -as opposed to its content- does not penetrate the aesthetic object... With [it] have to do the master-artist and the science of aesthetics, but not primary aesthetic contemplation... [All] this enormous technical work -without which there would be no works of art- carried out by the artist and studied by aesthetics does not enter the aesthetic object created by artistic contemplation, i.e. aesthetic existence as such, the ultimate end of a creation: all that is “withdrawn” at the time of artistic perception, as is the scaffolding once the building has been finalised... This immanent overcoming of language in poetry is radically different from its merely negative overcoming in the sphere of knowledge, i.e. its algebraisation, the use of conventional signs instead of words, the use of acronyms, etc.” (1986:54-57, my re-translation from Spanish).

It matters little, from the standpoint of the constitutive rule of literary speech whether it is used to produce literature or for any other purpose3, or whether the speaker’s rhetoric intention does not materialise in an aesthetically apt form - that is already a matter of value judgement. Such value judgement becomes, however, decisive when deciding whether an act of speech socially counts as literary. One is not a poet just because one “feels” or “expresses himself” as a poet, but because others consider him to be one. Speech, we saw, can only be accessed -and judged- from comprehension (including, of course, self-comprehension: the poet is his own first reader, critic and editor), whereby functionality -a more specific name for relevance- is always perceived functionality, whether intended or not. Unlike most pragmatic texts, the value 3

Let me make this distinction between literary speech and literature clear. Not all literary speech has as its purpose to produce literature. Literary speech is typical, for instance, of philosophy, essays and, in general, any language use that evinces concern for the extra-noetic, rhetorical effects of communication. This book, as a case in point, has been written by a speaker who is in love with speech and language, and who has personal experience with writing literature. A translation of this piece that was not faithful to my way of speaking but did not betray my strictly translatological LPI would function most aptly in the realm of academic literature. The aesthetic pleasure that I hope you feel while reading me, my friend, is simply the vinaigrette of my explanation of a general theory of mediation. This theory can survive unscathed an aesthetically mediocre verbalisation (whether translated or not) - but a poem, the very raison d’être of which is to move the reader by means of its aesthetic effect, could not. © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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i.e. functionality- of the great literary works is not reduced to the noetic content they express: Hamlet is more than the Prince’s history, his dilemma, his contradictions, the grave digger’s wisdom, Polonious’s pompousness, and so many things reducible to propositions - but neither does it lie exclusively in the formal trappings of Fo. The greatness of Hamlet is in the linguistic and dramatic way this noetic content becomes alive and hits us with the symbiotic beauty of the word and the noetic conception -of Fo and LPI- both in our heart and our head - with the cognitive and emotive synaesthesia4 of the aesthetic perception of speech, typical, but not exclusive, of literary speech. There are, moreover, non-literary acts of speech that produce aesthetic effects, and there are ones where such effects are not governed by a conscious intention, as is the case with so many young children who, unbeknownst to them, do marvels expressing their LPIs - or as the endearing hero of Skarmeta’s Neruda’s Mailman, better known in the moving and posthumous appearance by Roberto Troisi as Il postino, who is not even aware of his own metaphors. There are, also, speech acts governed by a failed intention to produce beauty. It is true that in the extreme case of poetry (as in that of humour based on metalinguistic use), what determines the aesthetic experience is the form in which the noetic space materialises. As Jakobson (1959) has it, in poetic speech the accent shifts from the axis of combination to that of selection: the specific weight moves from what toward how. However, if we reduce the distinction between literary and non-literary speech to a sheer problem of linguistic form, as if everything boiled down to poets or novelists simply putting a bit or a lot more care when verbalising their LPIs, we are ignoring the very essence of literature. The specificity of literary speech is that, unlike pragmatic speech, it does not only lend itself to, but rather induces a whole series of ever deeper and more refined semioses - i.e. a minute, almost obsessive and emotively charged application of the hermeneutic package as a function of or stimulated by LP comprehension and its immediate qualitative effects5, which are never produced by the formal aspects of verbalisation alone. Normally, as García Landa points out, speech comprehension is spontaneous, but a literary work never reveals its secrets so easily. This does not 4

Well, not exactly, since the effects are produced by noetic comprehension and come therefore a few milliseconds later - but for all practical purposes we can call the perception synaesthetic. 5

I am not going to push my luck by attempting to define such effects. All that is relevant for the nonce is that they exist, that their production, although not exclusive to, is the constitutive rule of literary speech, that they are a special kind of qualitative effects and that they may be produced by the comprehension of noetic content alone (the aesthetic effects produced, for instance, by the comprehension of a well rounded theory or of a deeply satisfying plot), or by a symbiosis of both noetic content and form. In any event, this is an avenue for empirical research. Whatever its results, they will but enrich and perfect our notions of Aa - the symbol and model, however, need not be changed: that is both the advantage and the beauty of mathetic notation. 266

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mean that in literary speech the step from Fo to LPCo -that first semiosis of sense that most times is enough in everyday life- is necessarily achieved with greater difficulty than in spontaneous speech6. The role of literary form, i.e. of form in literature, lies, then, in that it by spurring the qualitative effects of noetic comprehension it invites, orients and conditions ever deeper and more refined metarepresentations. In other words, the qualitative effects produced by the comprehension of a literary piece are such that the subject gets addicted, as it were: he feels the wish, maybe the need, to re-experience and, even, enhance them. This may more or less compel him to repeat his “exposure” to these effects by repeated acts of comprehension (pretty much the way he will wish to repeat his exposure to certain objects of natural perception: a landscape, a wine, a symphony, a painting). Thus, with repeated listenings or readings or evocations, new cognitive and qualitative effects are produced without those successive LPCos necessarily ceasing to be relevantly identical to the original LPIo7. Let me clarify, just in case, what I mean: The same reader (or, of course, different readers) can, for instance, not only find new pleasure in comprehension, but come up successively with an anti-Semitic and an antiracist reading of The Merchant of Venice. In this case, the interpretation of WZ and Yy i.e. of indirect intended sense or deep meaning- changes and, with it, the effects of comprehension, but not the comprehension of the noetic plate, i.e. of direct intended sense8. This is a key feature of written literary texts: they are meant to be comprehended repeatedly (although recorded sound has now permitted reexposure to acoustic perceptions that hitherto were by definition nonce events). This not only applies to self-contained acts of reading separated in time and space, but to each reading process itself, as the reader is compelled to backtrack in order to refine, complete or correct previous comprehension. As it is reread, the literary text, and most especially a lyric poem, offers the same stimulus, but the reader processes it differently every time. This has led textified mankind to think that somehow or other those “new” meanings are there, in the text, waiting 6

Except, of course, inasmuch as verbalisation becomes too twisted, as in Spanish baroque poetry, where spontaneous comprehension becomes at times impossible - which happens, as a matter of fact, with all unnatural speech, especially legalese; but these are statistically isolated phenomena, which are not specific to literary speech. By the way, the difficulty in spontaneously understanding markedly complex speech is but a corollary of its very lack of spontaneity. Such speech is difficult to understand simply because nobody -except a few insiders, and then as a result of strenuous practice- can speak like that spontaneously. 7

Although it can happen, of course. Insofar as LPC1≠LPC2 it is obvious that at least one of those LPCs is not relevantly identical to the LPI, i.e. that there has been at least one case of incomprehension.

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for the right reader to reveal themselves9. This, of course, is a shibboleth. True, authors do have consciously and/or unconsciously in mind several layers of meaning that they wish to convey by means of a specific LPIo (and, needless to add, a specific Fo), but they cannot be made responsible for every single interpretation their verbalisation thereof may give rise to in different people at different times (whence the theoretical and practical advantage of distinguishing between intended sense, and objective and deep meaning). Shakespeare would be no doubt surprised at the enormous amount of contradictory exegeses he has been subject to. This does not mean that all those exegeses are useless, arbitrary or wrong. On the contrary, great works of art are such because they open wide the door to the reader’s own imagination, analytic abilities and sensitivity. As any other reader, a translator, no matter how scholarly or keen, has in the end nothing but his own comprehension of meaning as presumably meant by the author. If (huge “if”!) meaning thus comprehended is identical to meaning as meant by the author, the reader/translator has understood him, i.e. has understood the text as the author meant it to be understood by his readers. If not, then no matter how justified the reader’s analysis and conclusions, he has not understood the author (i.e. his understanding of the utterance is not the same as the author’s own). He would be comprehending objective or deep meaning, or even direct but not indirect intended sense - which is the one that really matters to the author. Since authors tend to be dead, it is normally impossible to ascertain exactly what implicatures were counted on and which ones are fortuitous. Of course, this also applies to every other text; but non-literary acts of speech are less dependent for their success on any but the strongest of the possible weak implicatures or on the qualitative effects of comprehension. As I pointed out in Chapter IV, the great difference in the felicity conditions of a non-literary and a literary speech act can be thus reduced to the following: Nonliterary acts of speech can be deemed to be successful if the comprehension of the relevant noetic plate does not produce unwanted effects - this means that readers approach such texts with a much lower threshold of tolerance for all manner of formal infelicities. Non-literary speech acts need simply be good -i.e. relevant- enough: their felicity is judged negatively. The success of a literary speech act, on the other hand is judged positively: it is not enough for it not to produce certain effects or not to give rise to certain implicatures - good is never enough! And this, in the end, is the only reason why literary translation is “more difficult” than pragmatic translation. This theory and model, I submit, are the first ones to make relevantly explicit both what all modes and modalities of mediation have in common and what distinguishes them from each other. I may stress that the aesthetic effect (we can still call it somewhat loosely “beauty”) is such not simply because it “pleases,” but because it helps a very 9

This is, as I said Eco’s (2001) mistake when he refers to intentio operis; so much so that he himself forgets his words and starts speaking of the intention (almost always putative, of course) of the author and, indeed, of the translator. 268

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complex imbrication of cognition and emotion - which explains the fact that positive qualitative effects can be derived from the perception of “ugly” stimuli (which, in turn, is why really bad movies can become cult objects) or, needless to say, from the perception of “beautiful” representations of “ugly” objects, such as a literarily magnificent description of a carnage. In the case of speech, it can be derived, as I pointed out, on the basis of the qualitative effects of both LPI comprehension and Fo perception. Be that as it may, no matter how instantaneous these repercussions may seem, they are produced by LPI comprehension. Let us not forget, by the way, that the reader has approached the text with his own sensitivity, so that cognitive and qualitative effects themselves are always sieved through a subjective emotional filter. The real importance of form in art, speech, literature and, of course, translation lies, then, in the qualitative effects it produces or helps produce on a statistically relevant group of specific readers. From this perspective, form determines content (in that content is perceived as a function of form) pretty much as content determines form. This symbiosis of form and content impedes and, sometimes, altogether prevents the production of relevantly analogous qualitative effects once the LPIo becomes detached from Fo - which detachment, as García Landa argues, is the very condition of repeatability and, therefore, translation. Form in literature But what exactly is form in the case of literary speech? I shall venture a working definition: Form is the explicit or implicit adoption of a specific constraint to LPI verbalisation so that, if transgressed, the qualitative effects of comprehension are relevantly modified as well. In order to act as such, form must be perceived - either positively (as in the case of rhyme) or by default (as in the case of prose), whether consciously or unconsciously, as a result of an external stimulus or evocation10. I define by-default form as non-marked, as opposed to marked form, which is the one perceived positively. Any marked 10

In this respect, the perception of literary speech is not different from the perception of any other kinds of speech. Form vanishes and only the noetic mnesic trace remains. We do indeed remember snippets of F (a few complete poems, lines from others), but what stays with us of all those acts of reading is the memory of what was said and of the way it affected us (a bit like we remember how tasty a certain wine was); but the only way of having it present again is to perceive it once more (to evoke, or read, or hear anew). As with the taste of that wine, that can only be re-experienced by savouring it again “live and direct”; the memory of a form or of a taste is not to be mistaken, then, for the form or the taste themselves. True, in extremely rare occasions (extremely rare with respect to the immense black hole of forgotten forms), the form of certain acts of speech -literary or not- can be evoked mnemonically and then the effects are newly felt, but not, instead, the taste of a wine. The explanation is simple: the taste of wine is the product of a natural, first-degree perception, that of speech - the result of a social, second-degree perception. Voilà! This evocability of speech perceptions is what allows for experience to be remembered, or planned, or imagined, or communicated in absentia. © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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formal attribute will be marked with respect to a non-marked attribute and vice versa: marking and non-marking presuppose their opposite. Any marked form produces additional (positive or negative) contextual effects: that is why it is perceived as such. When I say that the “form” of the enunciation of Archimedes’s principle does not affect the principle itself I mean to say that it does not substantially alter the cognitive effects of comprehension. Identically, the semantic and syntactic differences between answering someone who offers us a cup of tea, ‘Yes, thank you’ or ‘I wouldn’t mind’ or ‘I’d love one’ or ‘If you’re so kind’ or ‘Why not?’ are normally irrelevant. And if it is irrelevant to LPIo comprehension, it will hardly matter in LPIi comprehension, i.e. in translation. Unless exceptional circumstances obtain, if we are to subtitle in Spanish the movie scene in which Louise offers John a cup of tea and he answers ‘If you please,’ it is the same to translate as ‘Si es tan amable’ [if you are so kind] or ‘Por favor’ [please] or ‘Con gusto’ [gladly]. The only constraint is that of screen space and time and the one relevant mark is register (in oral speech, hand in hand with its kinetic and paralinguistic configuration), which is the sole vehicle of illocutionary force and perlocution -i.e. courtesy- whatever, in principle, the morphosyntactic and semantic means. However, when the linguistic form becomes inextricably linked with the relevant qualitative aspects of LPI comprehension, there are seldom that many ways of achieving relevant identity, even intralinguistically: At times, even, either it is said that way or it will not be understood (at all or, at least, relevantly), as is the case with puns. Indeed, it is a completely different ball game if John, seeking to charm, amuse or mock Louise, answers ‘If you please, Louise.’ The smile or wince that, at the physical level, the simultaneous perception of the LPI and Fo elicits from Louise will never be elicited from anyone by replying ‘Por favor, Louise’ in Spanish. We can say that this gesture of pleasure or irritation resumes and reflects the result of the synaesthetic perception of noetic content and the formal features of the sign chain - the combination of cognitive and qualitative effects. The impossibility in translation11 is, as can be seen, more than the impossibility of re-saying what has been said in the same way: it is the impossibility of saying it in any which way that will produce the same or at least comparable qualitative effects. Such impossibility is not exclusive to literary translation, but manifests itself there much more frequently and clearly, especially in the case of lyric poetry, where it appears multiplied a thousandfold by the radical change of linguistic system and of all the other components of the speech act.

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This particular case does not pose major difficulties, of course: ‘Por favor, mi amor,’ or any such humorous reply will normally do. Besides, in oral speech humour need not be made manifest semantically or phonetically either: it can be conveyed by paralinguistic and/or kinetic means alone. 270

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There cannot be identity between perceptions of two different objects. What can be reproduced always, or almost, in another language is the noetic space, since the principle of repeatability applies to it alone. The vast number of translations of all manner of literary pieces that produce noetic LPIo/LPCi identity proves it; but one thing is to translate a literary text and quite another to translate it literarily (the translation of literature is not nor has always been literary). What in and of itself the existence of these translations cannot prove is the possibility of aesthetic equivalence, not so much between Fo and Fi as between FoLPCoAa and FiLPCiAa, i.e. of the aesthetic effects of LPI comprehension. In other words, if an analogous or comparable or similar effect or constellation of effects is to be achieved, the LPIi must now be relevantly verbalised, which necessitates not only mutating Fo into Fi, but also a relevant transmutation of LPCo into LPIi, with a preservation of the “non-negotiable” aspects of the social object that is meaning originally meant - i.e. of those aspects the modification of which would “betray” it, or, less prescriptively, produce comprehension of a different meaning, one not intended or, worse, at variance with the one intended. Needless to add that if identity between LPIo and LPCo -and more so between LPIo and LPCi- can be impossible to prove empirically, it is much more impossible to prove the similarity of aesthetic, or, for that matter, any kinds of qualitative effects. Yet, if we are not daunted by the objective inaccessibility of an LP, why should we panic at the equally objective inaccessibility of the aesthetic and generally qualitative effects of an act of literary speech? And if that is the case before translation is attempted, why should it matter more once it is embarked upon? What must be determined to begin with is not, as popular superstition has it, what counts or may count as functionally adequate equivalence between Fo and Fi when translating literature and in which cases. That cannot but be a corollary of this other fundamental question: What makes a literary translation literary? The answer seems obvious to me: A literary translation is one that strives -and manages- to function as literature and not simply inform the reader about the noetic content verbalised in the original. And to write literature is, simply, to produce literary speech, i.e. to produce aesthetic qualitative effects, to speak as a poet (in the widest sense, encompassing everyone who, in speaking, pursues and achieves such effects). As all literary speech, literary translation begins, then, with the speaker’s -in this case, the translator’s- specific motivation and pragmatic intention - except that it is no longer a matter of producing but of reproducing an LPI by means of a new literary act characterised by specific formal features (regardless of their similarity with those of the original one), which, by virtue of the formal constraints adopted, produces a certain comparable, analogous, similar or equivalent aesthetic effect. Do not fall into the temptation of dissecting the preceding string of adjectives, my reader: I myself am hard put to characterise semantically what kind of a relationship is supposed to obtain between the series of effects produced by the original upon its original

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readers, its contemporary readers, the translator and the present and future potential readers of the translation. For the time being, let me content myself with stating that a successful literary translation presupposes the successful production of these effects - let further research take us further. On the other hand, we better keep in mind something that is normally forgotten: The propositional articulation of an LPI (or, rather, of the series of LPIs that constitutes the arch-act) can also generate an aesthetic experience. Epopee and drama differ from poetry in a fundamentally noetic aspect: plot. That is why prose is more resilient to “bad” writing, whether original or secondhand, from dime novels12 to Dostoevski, and it is also why a novel or a play even if by such a consummate master of form as Dickens- are, in principle, “easier” to translate than a poem. The corollary is that epos and drama “travel” better than lyric poetry, since, besides being “easier” to translate, they tolerate aesthetically more mediocre translations13. We should not forget either that the cornerstone of figurative use, metaphor, is basically noetic, as are, therefore, the vast majority of tropes: metonymy, synecdoche, hyperbole and other. The great difference between poetry and prose lies, as we know, in a foregrounding of the formal space, with the concomitant backgrounding of the noetic plane, so that a sign and its matter become one: “the work of art [including, may I add, the literary text, SV] is thus a sign that also communicates the way it is constituted” (Eco 1988b:61-62). Indeed, insofar as the aesthetic percept is decisively a function of the perception of the features of the formal space, we cannot speak of identity tout court, since we have defined identity as the relationship between a perception and its cause (or, less problematically, sameness of meaning intended and comprehended). Here we are speaking about different causes, i.e. of different formal spaces. Thus, there is normally not much difficulty in reverbalising in an analogous metaphor the propositional content of ‘When my love swears that she is made of truth’ as the first line of Shakespeare sonnet CXXXVIII reads. The trouble starts when trying to reverbalise this LPI within certain formal constraints - for instance, as a Spanish hendecasyllable fitting the rhyme scheme of a sonnet with a view to producing relevantly comparable aesthetic qualia. The different verbalisations of an LPI, let us remember, are as many by definition different tokens of the same type. The great contradiction we must resolve, then, is that there come into play two different classes of objects: on the one hand, the LP, which is a subjective percept, accessible only insofar as it is 12

This is also why there is objective room for an industry of bad prose (even in translation), but hardly of bad poetry (and definitely not in translation) - I stand to be corrected, but I dare say that the qualitative effects of dime novels and the like are not altogether aesthetic, and they are produced well-nigh by the comprehension of propositional content alone. 13

The most eloquent case is that of literature for children: In western cultures, fairy tales are more or less the same in all languages, but not nursery rhymes, which are much more onomatopoeic than normal speech and can completely lack relevant noetic content. 272

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verbalised through an F of any kind; on the other, the original Fo, which, as any other specific F, is not a percept but an objective stimulus. Since comprehension is always a percept, what we are interested in is not the physical difference between the different semiotic stimuli, but their comparability - the analogy, equivalence or similarity of the contextual cognitive and emotive effects of the simultaneous perception of a single noetic content and the formal features of two or more different verbalisations (whether in the same language or in different ones). Let me insist, in this respect, that the semantic representation is but the semantic form of an LP. Such form, specific to each language, is as “untranslatable” as any other formal feature of Fo. As with all the other forms (syntactic, phonemic, prosodic, etc.), the most that a translator can do is “imitate” it more or less. Moreover, imitation is but one of the possibilities open to the translator. Formal discrepancies are inevitable at each and every level, including the semantic one. What matters is not the degree of discrepancy between forms, but rather whether the diverging features (most of the time discrepancies, but occasionally heterofunctional coincidences) are such that they stand in the way of relevant LPIo/LPCi identity. I shall not even try to tread upon aesthetics more than it is prudent, but we cannot understand the specificity of literary speech unless we place both speech act and LPI inside the speakers’ (and interlocutors’) intentionality and emotionality, incorporating the emotive subjectivity of both poles of interlingual literary communication that the translator must ascertain from the loneliness of his study, itself inundated with emotionality. Every translator strives to perceive and feel and have others perceive and feel what he has perceived and felt by intermittently reading the original, writing his reverbalisation and reading it himself. The basic question a true literary translator asks himself, which does not bother his pragmatic colleague, is not so much ‘How do I say what I have understood so that my reader understands it?’ but rather ‘How do I say what I have understood so that my reader, in understanding it, feels what I have felt14?’ And this question generates great anxiety, because the translator feels that what he has felt comes from the synaesthesia produced by the (quasi-) simultaneous perception of LPIo and the formal attributes of Fo (always as a function of his own sensitivity, his hermeneutic package, his adroitness at applying it and his 14

Lately, of course, with a massive commercialisation of literature, many good and, especially, bad translators, out of necessity or greed, accept translating works that they do not like or that do not move them. In such instances, the translator acts as the mercenary that his pragmatic colleague cannot help being, called upon as he is to translate mendacious advertisements, owner’s manuals for overpriced appliances or contracts between companies whose main purpose is to cheat the consumer out of his money. At this point, it is no longer a matter of the translator conveying what he felt as a reader (it could be disastrous!), but rather what as a potential reader he was supposed to have felt. This also explains, by the way, why successful literary translation necessitates a high level of empathy between author and translator: a translator can only hope to move and convince if he himself is convinced and moved. © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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predisposition to apply it). The translator is also aware, besides, that no matter how hard he may try, those features cannot be “translated” - not even “reproduced.” Some lose heart and give up altogether, others die in the attempt, a few achieve wonders, but the aftertaste of a defeat foretold can never be wholly vanquished: as Mounin (1963) warned, a translation cannot be the original! Except that this aftertaste of defeat is privy only to those who, as the translator himself, have access to the original, and, therefore, do not need the translation either to understand the original or to be moved by it. This aftertaste can only be felt by the innocent readers if the translation disappoints their expectations - if it fails to produce qualitative effects that are relevant to them, regardless of the effects that the original would produce on them if they only had access to it. The overall relevance of contextual effects for the innocent reader explains, as well, the opposite phenomenon, to wit that many “defective” translations may be wholeheartedly embraced by the target culture and literature. The reader cannot judge a translation qua translation, i.e. with respect to LPIoFo - and this is the torpedo that sinks the manipulationists’ Lusitania: alone and of itself, the fact that millions of readers have treasured the King James Bible for four centuries does not tell us anything about its strictly translational quality - that I know of, it is plagued with mistakes (such as the spooky and rather oxymoronic “Holy Ghost” completing the Holy Trinity). Only a translation critic is in a position to pass such judgement, yet most reviewers who “judge” translations are merely judging the acceptability of LPIiFi, or, rather, the relevance of FiUZLPCiAa - they are judging the translation as an original, like the Southern preacher who, in advocating an “English as the official language law,” ejaculated: ‘If English was good enough for the Lord, it should be good enough for the United States of America!’ (No, dear reader, I cannot give you the bibliographical data, but I read it with my own eyes in a newspaper -probably The New York Times- at the time the issue became hotly discussed in the USA some fifteen or twenty years ago.) Especially in literary translation, then, it all does not boil down to perceiving the same LPI, but both to perceiving the same LPI and to the respective percepts produced by different verbalisations producing, in turn, qualitatively comparable effects - which is, again, what distinguishes literary or literarily marked speech from all other forms. As is the case with literary writing in general, in literary translation, in other words, relevance is defined primarily in terms of qualitative and, more specifically, aesthetic effects. So much so that the most enduring translations -the King James Bible towering among themowe their privileged status more to their inherent aesthetic qualities than to the finer points of LPIo/LPCi identity: There are many, more accurate translations that do not come near it in literary terms and will most probably remain forever in its shadow: only a better translation of comparable literary worth is likely to dethrone it as a translation. As a literary monument in its own right, one can guess, the King James will survive as long as Shakespeare, if with much 274

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diminished theological (i.e. strictly translational) relevance. This is the great contradiction of literary translation: The translator must produce a translation that is, at the same time, instrumental and documentary, both overt and covert, semantic and communicative, the work of a human being getting inspiration from his innermost self who manages a maximum illusion of transparency15 - an active mediation that goes almost completely unnoticed. The great difficulty lies, let me repeat, in the stubborn fact that the formal space, no matter how decisive, can never be translated, so that the readers of the original and of the translation can never perceive the same form, even if the translator has managed to imitate it in its most minute details16. What is a “tradtheoret” to do in view of this inexorable circumstance? Either of two things: a) throw in the towel invoking as an alibi that literary speech is sui generis (and, strictly speaking, it is not, since there is a continuum along which it is impossible clearly to discriminate the different kinds of speech), so much so that there is no way of re-saying literarily in another language; or b) try and apply thoroughly his knowledge of speech in general and see how far it goes in explaining the production and comprehension of literary speech and the specific features conditioning the possibility of re-saying literarily in a language that which has been literarily said in another so that the respective aesthetic effects are comparable. The first thing to do, I believe, is to understand that literary translation (much more than non-literary translation, but not as opposed to it) has two methodologically distinct components: The reverbalisation of an LPI, and its cultural and aesthetic recontextualisation. We have seen that cultural recontextualisation is not specific to literary translation, so the big difference between this and other types of mediation is the decisive relevance of the aesthetic effect produced by LPI comprehension. So long as such an effect is a product of the formal space -never completely dissociable from the noetic one- and as structural differences between languages impose different limitations or offer different possibilities, literary translation becomes in the end translation and something else, which we can call artistic recreation or

15

Whatever we, translatologists, may say or think about the translator’s visibility, the fact remains that most readers, no matter how opaque the translation and intrusive the translator, will never attribute any content or formal features to him. Venuti himself points out that his “visibility” will remain invisible to most readers. Nabokov’s translation of Eugene Onegin is as opaque as can be feared, and the translator much more intrusive than the poet himself. Still, most readers think they are reading Pushkin rather than Nabokov (even if they are basically wrong in their assumption). 16

Even so, let us remember that, when assessing the effectiveness of a translation, the relationship between the attributes of Fo and Fi becomes relevant only insofar as aesthetic and other contextual effects respectively depend on them. Whenever we speak of the aesthetic functionality of translational speech we will have to examine the features of verbalisation also from the standpoint of their functionality. © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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simply recreation (as many have seen, among them the great Edmond Cary17), or, as I suggest, literary mediation: Literary translation becomes, then, simply a very special, extreme case of interlingual mediation. My general theory of mediation, alas, cannot -at least for now- but stop at the necessarily diffuse and elusive limit that never separates quite effectively noetic content (i.e. an LPI proper) from its formal incarnation - and, as I have said, insofar as noetic and formal spaces become inextricable, the scission between what is noetic and what is poetic can become impossible. From then on, as we shall see, analysis and assessment let go of their translatological handle and slip down the evermore subjective slope of literary criticism. Since every literary translation is but the re-expression of an LPI canonically verbalised by means of a certain Fo, it can be perceived and judged at three levels: a) As a reverbalisation of an LPI (i.e. as any other translation); b) with respect to the relationship between the formal features of the canonical and the translated chains, i.e. between Fo and Fi; and c) as a work of literature in the target language - except that the first two perceptions are only possible for a bilingual reader, who, precisely, does not need a translation. It is paradoxical, but translations can only be judged with full knowledge by people who have no need for them and who, because of that, lack the “innocence” of a spontaneous reader - which, as I have said, explains the relative success of some translations that could not survive a strictly translatological analysis18. Literary translation becomes sui generis with perception b), i.e. at the level of the relationship that the translator decides or manages to establish between Fo and Fi. Here we glide along a relationship of degrees of resemblance, similitude or analogy between tokens, between the formal features of the canonical and other verbalisations of an LPI (in the same or different languages) and of their effects. At the end of this cline we find Nida19 and his concept of dynamic equivalence leading smoothly into outright adaptation. Perception c), of the text in the target language, independently of the fact that is has been arrived at through translation, completely escapes translatology, and I find it quite paradoxical that it should be the one manipulationists so fervently hold on to. There is no need to be a bilingual reader, and much less a translator, to judge the literary merits and demerits of any text in one’s own language - whether original, pseudotranslation (could anyone tell me the difference?20), or translation. Most translation reviews published in the press are by readers specialising in literature, who very often 17

1953, 1963 and, most especially, 1986.

18

This applies also to bad interpreters: there are quite a few who substitute a pleasant voice and elegant diction for accuracy. 19

1964, 1977, 1978, 1994 and 1996.

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The pride of Spanish literature, Don Quixote, is a pseudotranslation. What does this tell us that is minimally relevant to translation? What do translators of it into any language care? Spanish readers, I can promise, definitely do not - because we can read it in the original. 276

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have not read or cannot read the original. These reviewers limit themselves because this is their own personal limitation- to judging the translated text as a text, which is fine, but far from enough. In other words, the analysis of the LPIo/LPCi relationship is the general one that literary translation shares with all kinds of translational speech. The analysis of the relationship between Fo and Fi is specific to literary translation (if shared with any documentary translational speech) and has to do with what we might call the “representativity” of Fi with respect to Fo. And the question here is neither of interpretive or descriptive use, since we are not dealing with noetic content but with linguistic form. (In other words, unless enhanced in order to take account of non-cognitive effects, relevance theory proves equally incapable of explaining literary speech and a fortiori, literary translation.) An original sonnet wonderfully translated into prose does not function as a token of the gender “poetry,” or of the sub-gender “metric/rhymed,” or of the subsubgender “sonnet”; and if translated any which way (as is -alas!- normally the case in Spanish21), it does not even function as a representative of literary speech. The analysis of the translated text as an autonomous literary work, on its part, has to do exclusively with how and to what degree the new text is incorporated into the target language literature. The formal constraints of the noetic space Due to the reification of speech through writing, as I have indicated, translation has been hypostasised as a problem of correspondences between formal, especially semantic, spaces. Let us then take a closer look at the relationship between sense and form. In the majority of speech acts, an LPI determines its form, in that it is ontologically and chronologically prior to it. In spontaneous speech, the sign chain is put together, in conjunction with relevant paralinguistic and kinetic factors, with little room for self-editing and none for polishing. One speaks as one speaks, and when one speaks again in order to say it better, one speaks linearly once more. What has been said cannot be edited: all that one can do is produce, in a new speech act and through a new F, a new perception that supersedes, complements or nuances the previous one. Given an LPI, there are speakers who express themselves linguistically well, who by dint of talent and/or studious practice know how to couch their LPIs in more elegant, precise, melodious, vivid, clear or succinct terms - and then there are those who cannot. As there are those who articulate better, or have a more pleasant voice, or add kinetic clarity and liveliness, independently of the features of their Fs - but it is seldom an end in itself; rather, it all boils down to an apter or more awkward use of the semiotic tools (linguistic and non-linguistic) with a view to communicating an LPI and thereby producing certain effects. The same applies to the speaker who decides to write a short story, a novel, a play or an epic 21

You need not take my word for it: Santoyo (1996) provides ample lamentable proof. © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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poem: There is an awareness of what one wishes to say that is ontologically and chronologically prior to the act of speech. Plot and situations are, in principle, thought out and decided upon beforehand, regardless of whether, as the speaker writes in order to “say” them, things may change under the dialectic influence of the act of verbalising upon the awareness of meaning to mean. But besides meaning to mean, the speaker always says in a certain way. This way can be analysed from two complementary standpoints: general and particular. Consciously or unconsciously, and for whatever objective or subjective reasons, a speaker chooses among more or less established, codified, typical ways, that his interlocutors can recognise and, normally, accept, but he also says it his own way, which, because it is such, can be distinguished from that of all other speakers, including himself on other occasions. Such a way is not limited to the features of F (which constitute style proper), but comprises C and E as well (people who “know how to speak” know how to harmonise F, C and E22) even though in the case of written and, especially, literary speech, the relative importance of the latter two is lesser than in orality - lesser, but not nil (punctuation, as a case in point, is the province of C). These socially codified or individual ways of speaking take us back to the concept of marking. Speech is seen as marked whenever its noetic or formal features “break” the interlocutor’s expectations, i.e. whenever it departs from the social norm obtaining in a specific case. Once a speaker has established new expectations (i.e. once he has tricked his interlocutor into accepting his own idiosyncrasies as “normal”), then he can break them anew by returning to what started by being non-marked speech23. Since noetic content is always translatable, the marking of the noetic space (viz., via metaphors or other semantic tropes) poses no major 22

We can say that the idiosyncrasy of F reflects the way of saying and that of FCE - the way of speaking. A writer’s style is, for all practical purposes, sheer F, that of a speaker is FCE, which explains why it was possible that the style with which Neruda the speaker read the poems by Neruda the writer was so calamitous. 23

By his own proclamation, Venuti’s (1998) minoritising approach -an active “political,” as he himself calls it, stand- leads him to mark his translation of Tarchetti’s Fosca in a myriad contradictory ways (Britishisms, Americanisms, archaisms, etc.) with the specific purpose of challenging his reader’s expectations or even complacency and calling his attention to the fact that he is reading a translation of the piece and not the piece itself. His is a rather extreme case of active overt mediation out of the translator’s personal agenda. I find no fault in principle, although, personally, I prefer as a rule to have the illusion that I am reading the original. I would wish for as much or as little idiosyncracy as the author himself imbued his novel with, a translation that would be the closest representation of the original as the target language will allow: no “standardisation” where the original was non-standard, and no “innovation” where there was none to begin with. This, of course, is not the way Venuti sees things or likes his translations. In other words, what counts as relevant LPIo/LPCi identity for him does not count as such for me - which does not mean that I would not enjoy reading his translation as Venuti’s reworking -rather than translation- of Tarchetti. Knowing Venuti’s hermeneutic scholarship and heuristic prowess, I am sure that he succeeds brilliantly at the task he has set out to accomplish. 278

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problems, so let us tackle the marking of the formal space. Speakers can, consciously or unconsciously, depart from a norm (which would be, in each case, the zero marking degree) and mark their speech in such or such other way. The clash between two different -and, especially, opposed- norms is always perceived as marked (for instance, the mixture of registers, or of prose and verse). Besides the norm against which the speech act itself is perceived, each act creates, in turn, certain expectations by establishing an internal norm the abandonment of which is, itself, a mark. We start writing in verse and we break a norm: the pulsating iambic pentameter functions as a mark, but once the reader is used to the rhythm that initially surprised him and begins to expect it to be maintained (without being aware of it, just out of inertia), its sudden interruption is highly marked. Verse is a mark of poetry and, therefore, it is not a mark in poetry. Instead, it is a mark in prose. Within a series of iambic pentameters, any different rhythm is marked; within a series of blank verses, rhyme appears as marked. Unexpected lexical collocations are also always marked (and that is the poets’ special specialty). Every dialectal or idiolectal speech is marked with respect to the general norm. From the translational standpoint, the problem with the marking of the formal space is, on the one hand, that, structurally, languages lend themselves more or less to different types of marking and, on the other, that conventions change, and with them the acceptability of and qualitative effects produced by those different types of marking. The more the marking of the formal space is decisive for the qualitative effects of comprehension, the more difficult it will become to produce similar effects in translation (I wonder why this obviously universal “law” of translation has escaped so many bent on finding them!). Let us remember that a formal mark -or, more succinctly, form- only works if it is perceived. There is no other form than that which is perceived: In painting only the colours in the visible part of spectrum count, and in music only those sounds that a human being can hear. If the number of wyes in this book is the exact square of the irregular past tenses in the First Canto of Dante’s Commedia, whether I had the conscious intention that it be so or not, there is no way to perceive it. Ergo - it does not matter24. There are other marks that some readers can perceive and others cannot, for instance intertextual allusions. Other marks are literally impossible to reproduce in a given language: Hercule Poirot speaks English with a marked French interference. It is the most marked feature of his idiolect, the one that most distinguishes him from the very British cast around him. In a good, say, Spanish translation he must speak Spanish with the same 24

In a broadcast of Schönberg’s Moses und Aaron, Sir Georg Solti explained that in order really to enjoy the piece one had to follow it with the score. True, “seeing” a sound, i.e. knowing that it must be there in the acoustic stimulus, can actually help perceive it (at least with one’s imagination), but let us not fool ourselves: it is not enough to know how the sound must be to hear it when it actually sounds. Identically, graphic rhyme is rhyme only if one can hear it: whatever the conventions, love and move don’t rhyme. © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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kind and degree of interference (which is to be perceived, of course, where French differs from Spanish, and not where it differs from English!), thus distinguishing himself with equal intensity from the surrounding characters who, very British as they must stay, will all speak mostly non-marked Spanish; but how is the French translator to have Poirot speak French with French interferences, so that he can be distinguished from the French spoken by the very British characters around him25? Seidensticker (1990) mentions the trend by some contemporary Japanese writers to imitate “western” syntactic clarity (as Lu Xun did in his translations into Chinese), striving to compensate for the lack of relative pronouns in their language. How could an English translator reproduce a syntactic mark in the original whose purpose it is to have it resemble English? In several XIX-century Russian novels (viz. War and Peace), aristocratic characters speak French between themselves and Russian to their servants or the bourgeois. The change in code alone communicates a world of implicatures. What is the French translator to do? As a translator - absolutely nothing! As a mediator, he can try and explain the “joke” in a footnote, while typographically marking within Fi proper the passages originally in French, thus displacing the internal marking in Fo to FiCn, i.e. to a difference between the normal font and a marked one (almost invariably italics). But that is only the first half of the problem. It is no use for the speaker to strive to mark or not to mark his utterance if his interlocutor cannot perceive such marking. If the possibility to mark is only a function of the feature of a specific language, and the effectiveness of the marking but a function of the translator’s heuristic ability, mark perception, in the end, is always a matter of the knowledge, sensitivity and predisposition of whoever actually reads the translation and of his statistical abstraction - the “model” or potential reader. In any event, the problem of form in speech in general and in literature in particular can be reduced, therefore, to marking; and so can the problem of form in translation. Writing masks the spontaneity of speech simply because it has the gift of modifying the past. Written texts as they reach their readers are normally the end product of a series of truncated and forever vanished attempts at communicating. In the majority of texts without an aesthetic intention, and especially in the purely informative ones, this saying and then saying again differently before saying becomes “official” has no other end than to allow for a greater effectiveness of expression, i.e. for greater cognitive relevance. And since in most pragmatic texts what matters is immediate and direct LPI comprehension, all translation scholars and all (competent) translators agree that, barring exceptions, similarity or equivalence between the different features of Fo and Fi does not matter all that much when translating them. Indeed, in consecutive interpretation, no matter how much the original utterance has been written, 25

One always has the possibility of having him speak an ostensively Belgian French, but it is not the same. 280

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rewritten and rehearsed, once Fo has vanished from memory, it is literally useless even to try and model Fi on the basis of Fo. As we have seen, consecutive interpretation, where the independence of LPI with respect to Fo and Fi is most clearly manifest, has lead the Parisians completely to minimise not only the relationship between Fo and Fi, but also between LPIo and Fo. This is the mistake that other theoreticians have taken them to task for and that I am trying to remedy by returning to form (and not only linguistic form) the place it indeed has in communication and translation26. Remember, also, that writing allows for and causes, besides, a multiplicity of acts of comprehension: there are marks that are only perceived after many readings. As every act of editing and amendment by the writer, each act of reading by the reader is spontaneous. Marks that are perceived after countless readings are also perceived spontaneously... there is no other way of perceiving. It happens in music, when listening to Beethoven’s Fifth for the umpteenth time we suddenly perceive this instrumental touch or that melodic arc that had always been there, in that very recording, but had theretofore eluded us. (This is why not even the best simultaneous interpreter can mark his own speech as the one by the poet being quoted is marked. And this is also why the interpreters’ own clients could probably not perceive those marks either, since normally they would have not come to the conference to listen to poetry, but, say, to negotiate the price of oil27). The writer and his translator, instead, write for persistent readers who will read and understand again and again (even if within the same global act of reading), paying often utmost attention to the formal details of Fi, pausing to ponder similes and metaphors, to savour alliterations or to wince at awkward rhymes or sloppy prose. And now for something completely practical Take this text: Along the rough Magdalena, dilated prologue to the ocean, birds croak on isles charred by the sun. The boatman rows on, a prisoner in his narrow canoe, his oar drawing interrogation marks in the water. Almost black and luminous green, the packed and flexible jungle zigzags along sleepy, lost and pensive. The boatman rows on. An indolent seagull flies by, just two lines intersecting against the sky. The crane looks like a white stave. On rows the boatman. The 26

It is remarkable how the different conceptual approximations to translation carry the imprint of the theoreticians’ experience: Obsessive literalness comes from centuries of translation of sacred texts (whose mysterious “word” must conserve all its mystery). Nida’s dynamic equivalence is the direct result of the translator’s evangelising zeal (a paradigmatic illustration of the decisive importance of the interlingual mediator’s WZ), which can only prosper if the Word becomes readily un-mysterious. Seleskovitch and Lederer’s interpretive theory, with its revolutionary concept of deverbalisation, is the child of consecutive conference interpreting. All these cases bear out once again Marx’s assertion that praxis determines awareness. 27

There are exceptions, of course, such as international symposia on translation, for instance. © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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sun smears everything with an oily patina. It is impossible to tell whether the monkey that agitates itself on the tree is greeting or crying in the heat. The boatman rows on. When will Barranquilla appear? A cayman watches on the sand with its jaws enormously agape. Fish, golden, shine. The rotten carcass of a cow floats by. On rows the boatman. Ports stretching out their blackened embraces. Children, malnourished and intensely gazing. Hunger, oil, cattle. On rows the boatman. The boatman rows on, sitting, silent and tired. The boatman rows on, a prisoner in his narrow canoe, his oar drawing interrogation marks in the water.

As any other text, this is the corpse of a speech act now resuscitated by your eyes. You know nothing about its author, nor where, when, why, what for or for whom he wrote it. There are a few clues: The names Magdalena and Barranquilla, plus the tropical landscape, take us to Colombia; oil is a XXth century commodity. In any event, the LPI seems clear. It is obvious that we are dealing with a (mediocre) “literary” text: we can perceive a transparent intention to speak in a certain way, thereby producing certain aesthetic effects. The form that can be perceived (which makes us think that it is a “literary text” and not just a pragmatic description) is, noetically, in the decidedly optical perspective adopted by the writer, and at the level of Fo, in the sentences juxtaposed without subordination or coherence markers - as if the film were shown frame by frame (which invites us, readers, to a keen reconstruction of time), and in certain collocations, register, the rhetorical question, the nominal constructions, repetitions, inversions, etc., which pursue obvious aesthetic aims. The propositional and referential content is apparent without form seeming to condition it in any special way. This is an effect that most probably can be reproduced without much difficulty in many other languages for the benefit of readers more or less such as ourselves. In other words, there is nothing in the verbalisation of the LPI that seems inextricably linked to the possibilities and limitations specific to English. Apart from register, the writer does not seem to have adopted any formal constraint - he simply says. He says not very idiomatically, though. Is this intentional? Is this, therefore, aesthetically relevant? In any event, whether literary or not, this one does not look like a text that is difficult to translate: the LPI is easily reverbalisable. Let us try a semantic transcription into Spanish, according to the possibilities and limitations of this second language: Por el áspero Magdalena, prólogo dilatado del océano, pájaros que graznan en los islotes calcinados por el sol. El botero rema, prisionero de su estrecha canoa, dibujando con su remo signos de interrogación en el agua. Casi negra o verde luminoso, la jungla apretada y flexible zigzaguea soñolienta, perdida y pensativa. El botero rema. Pasa volando indolente una gaviota, apenas dos líneas cruzadas contra el cielo. La garza parece una estaca alba. Rema el botero. El sol lo unta todo de una pátina aceitosa. No se sabe bien si el mono que se agita en el árbol saluda o chilla en la canícula. El botero rema. ¿Cuándo aparecerá Barranquilla? Un caimán vigila sobre la arena con sus fauces 282

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desmesuradamente abiertas. Fulguran, áureos, los peces. Pasa flotando la carcasa putrefacta de una res. Rema el botero. Puertos que extienden su abrazo renegrido. Niños desnutridos y de mirada intensa. Hambre, petróleo, ganado. Rema el botero. El botero rema, sentado, silencioso y exhausto, prisionero de su estrecha canoa, dibujando con su remo signos de interrogación en el agua.

The semantic form of English has been imitated as close as Spanish allows, but without doing violence to its syntactic system or resorting to unidiomatic collocations: It is a perfectly idiomatic text -better, I may add, than the original- and I do not think anybody could guess that it is a translation. Still, the difference with respect to the original is so slight, I submit, that it can hardly be perceived. As a literary or aesthetically equivalent translation of the original text, this one is more than acceptable. Indeed, but for the order in which they have been presented, how could you infer that the Spanish text is a translation of the original English and not vice versa? Whatever the improvements you may think of, the translation is quite successful in that it allows you to understand all the relevant aspects of what the original writer plausibly meant to say: That I know of, I have duly understood the LPIo (so that LPIo = LPCo); I have made it wholly my own (so that LPCo=LPIi); and I have verbalised it with due attention to the noetic and aesthetic aspects, so that a reader such as you can produce upon reading my Fi an LPCi that is transitively identical to the LPIo in all its relevant noetic and functional aspects, i.e. including the relevant contextual effects (so that, in this specific case LPIo=LPCi equals LPIo[=]LPCi: I have hardly had to mediate at all - I just “translated”). As I have stressed so often, such identity is impossible to prove: it can only be posited; but it does not take inordinate credulity to trust that I have achieved it in this particular case. We can state that we are dealing with one and the same LP verbalised in two different languages. What I want to analyse, however, is form. Morphosyntactically, semantically and prosodically, Fo and Fi are more or less equivalent and equally marked with respect to their respective norms of literary use. This is the key: When an LPIo is verbalised in a linguistically non-marked form, the translator’s only real concern is not to mark his own verbalisation unduly - unless, of course, he is obsessed with making himself visible or seeks to jolt the reader. The translator’s freedom is thus defined negatively - we can only establish, really, what is not to be done. Moreover, if marking or non-marking is unintentional (as is normally the case with spontaneous speech and most careless writing): a bit more or less marking is easily tolerated. Let us not lose sight of the fact that the vast majority of readers read translations because they do not have access to the original. They assume that the LPI will be relevantly verbalised, so that if they understand the translation, they presume they have understood the noetic content of the original; but they are rarely in a position to judge the original form or its “likeness” to the translation’s. How does a Haiku sound in Japanese? A poet’s (or any other speaker’s) rhetoric ability lies always in exploiting the possibilities and © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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overcoming the limitations specific to his language - but always in the service of a communicative intention, of the verbalisation of an LPI (except, as we shall see, in the case of purely formal exercises): always with a view to responsive comprehension. At times, these possibilities and limitations resemble those of the target language, or the latter offers more or less analogous ones. Since in the West comparisons have been limited for the most part to translations between Indo-European languages, analysts tend to fall into the trap of not seeing how dissimilar languages can really be. A general theory of translation cannot exclude literary translation, but it can neither limit itself to written translation, let alone to translation between languages as similar to each other as those of the same family, no matter how much they may seemingly differ28. Since a) what concerns both communication and translation when evaluating verbal form is the way the perception of such formal features affects the global speech perception, i.e. to what extent the acoustic and noetic percepts form an aesthetically inextricable unity, and b) possibilities and limitations are language-specific, as they are also specific to different musical instruments, the most that a translator can hope for is to produce in its reader a percept that is as synaesthetically analogous to the one produced by the original as the possibilities and limitations of his instrument allow. What must be understood once and for all is that beauty is not in Fo, but in the effect produced by its perception, which always is a “side effect” of noetic comprehension29. As Antonio Porchia30 says in his wonderful aphorism, “La tierra tiene lo que tú levantas de la tierra. Nada más tiene” [The earth has what you lift up from the earth. That’s all it has31]. In our case, we are referring to the effects of comprehension that the translator has perceived as beauty and the effects that he then manages to produce in his readers through their own comprehension. Isolated, as a rule, both from his author and his reader, the translator perceives and trusts that he shall be able to make perceive except that at times, and especially in the case of poetry, the respective roles of 28

Think of the extreme case of poetry in sign languages, where the features of the formal space are optic rather than acoustic, and spacial rather than linear. Is it possible to translate poetry from gestural to verbal language or vice versa? The noetic plate, undoubtedly; and that is the quid of García Landa’s general theory. The aesthetic effects probably only with enormous difficulty, since we are dealing with altogether different first-degree perceptual systems, whilst, by definition, only second-degree percepts can be reproduced. 29

You listen to an utterance in a language you cannot understand and you may like or dislike the noise it makes, but, in principle, you have no idea of whether what you hear is a poem or a birth certificate read aloud. 30

I am sure I am not patronising you if I tell you that he is a contemporary Argentine poet, born in Italy, whose most celebrated work is a collection of aphorisms called Voces. I am also sure I would be patronising you if I translated the title. 31

An interesting translation problem: what is the best way to render the LPIo behind the intriguingly repeated “tierra” in English: “earth,” “land,” “soil”? I am not a native speaker, so I am not at all sure that I have chosen the aptest one. 284

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form and content, of Fo and LPIo, become inverted, and the former completely determines the latter. It is the case with many formal experiments. Argentine Leopoldo Marechal offers us a telling example in Las cuatro estaciones del arte, one of the essays in his Cuaderno de navegación. He writes: “Acabo de leerle a Rafael Squirru los versos que siguen: “Si el mar en donde nacen redomones y espumas asentadas no acatase las leyes que gobiernan al cuarzo y a la rosa, vigilaría el Secreto su obstinado cerrojo de metal y la sirena entonces callaría su grito y sus esponjas.” Rafael... me pregunta ya si estoy lanzándome a una nueva lírica en el campo de lo “no figurativo”, o si mi estrofa encierra una intención metafísica bien meditada. Le respondo que ni una cosa ni la otra:... La estrofa no es más que un ejercicio de métrica en que me proponía y logré construir un verso de dieciocho sílabas, integrado por un endecasílabo y un heptasílabo que se convirtieran el uno en el otro, respectivamente, según la cesura del hemistiquio... La estrofa... produce una mentirosa “ilusión” de la poesía... por dos factores engañosos: la presencia de un ritmo verbal (mero fruto de taller) y sobre todo del “prestigio poético” que los vocablos tienen de por sí, aunque se hallen libres y sólo expresen la hermosura individual de la forma que representan y no la hermosura del “concepto poético” que debieran expresar colectivamente si el artífice hubiera elaborado ad intra ese concepto antes de pasar a los trabajos ad extra del idioma.” [I have just read to Rafael Squirru the following lines: “If the sea where half-tamed horses and thrown out foams are born Did not abide by the laws governing quartz and rose, I’d watch over the Secret’s obdurate metal lock And thus the siren would withhold her scream and her sponges.” Rafael asks me whether I am embarking upon a new lyric in the “nonfigurative” realm, or whether my strophe hides a well-pondered metaphysical intention. I reply to him that neither the one nor the other: My strophe is but a metric exercise whereby I strove and managed to put together an eighteensyllable verse composed of a heptasyllable and a hendecasyllable that would respectively become the other depending on where the caesura is made. The strophe produces a mendacious “illusion of poetry” by dint of two misleading factors: the presence of a verbal rhythm (a purely technical artifice) and, above all, the “poetic prestige” of the words in themselves, even though they are free and only express the individual beauty of the form they represent and not the beauty of the “poetic concept” that they should be collectively expressing if the creator had ideated such concept ad intra before engaging in the ad extra workings of language.]

In other words, there is no LPI behind Fo, and there being no LPI there is nothing to translate. Of course, Squirru and all the other readers, even if aware © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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of the completely aleatory nature of Fo, refuse to renounce semiosis: If we read closely enough, it must mean something! Indeed, as must Chomsky’s furiously sleeping colourless green ideas. If a reader believes to have discovered an LPIo that was hidden to Marechal himself (a deep meaning of which the poet never became aware), he may well try to translate - whether imitating the form or not; but in this case his translation would indeed be the reverbalisation of an LPIo i.e. of meaning as presumably meant. One thing is for sure, a translation of the whole of Marechal’s text (of the arch LPIo built around and as a consequence of that senseless bit of Fo) becomes entirely a-functional if the translator chooses semantic equivalence over rhythmic imitation, as was the case above with my own translation. If you cannot read Spanish, dear reader, you are still wondering what the deuce did Marechal achieve with those blissfully silly lines of his. As a matter of fact, the only way I could have you perceive the formal, prosodic, features of Fo would be through an imitation whose only semantic constraint would be in the “poetic prestige” of the lexemes I chose. Is it at all possible? Well, not quite: there are no English equivalents of the Spanish heptasyllable and hendecasyllable, nor is there an equivalent to a caesura. The Spanish heptasyllable’s only formal requirement is a strong accent on the sixth syllable, whilst the hendecasyllable demands a strong accent on the tenth and another on the sixth or, alternatively, the fourth and/or eight, but never on the fifth or seventh. In other words, the sixth syllable cannot be obviously unstressed. Now, if you want the first seven syllables of an eighteen-syllable line to sound like a heptasyllable, you need a strong accent on the sixth syllable, which is fine if you want the first eleven syllables to sound like a hendecasyllable. Once you have thus segregated your first seven syllables, in order for the remaining eleven to sound like a hendecasyllable you need a strong accent on the thirteenth syllable (i.e. the sixth of the last eleven syllables). And then you need a final strong accent on the seventeenth syllable. It all seems more complicated than it really is... provided your ears are tuned to a syllabic, rather than tonic or syllabo-tonic, system, to wit: 7: -----/- plus 11: -----/---/- = 18

or 11: -----/---/- plus 7: -----/- = 18

Your eighteen-syllable line, then, must have the following accent pattern: -----/---/--/---/with fixed strong accents on syllables 6, 10, 13 and 17 - a feat that is impossible to achieve within a tonic or syllabo-tonic system. An English “verse” that exhibited such pattern could be:

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A powerful semiosis, conscious, spurious, uneven and eventful

Now, do you perceive two different possible caesuras, one after “semiosis” and another after “spurious”... You do? Chapeau! Perhaps this sounds “more natural:” An iambic trimeter: A powerful semiosis

followed by an iambic pentameter: unkempt, aloof, uneven and eventful.

Except that A powerful semiosis, unkempt, aloof, uneven and eventful

does not lend itself to be divided into an iambic pentameter followed by an iambic trimeter. If Marechal’s “poem” is to be relevantly translated into English, the translator must find some other means to mark his prosody, some other kind of new English verse... or give up on this particular brand of marking altogether. My general theory of mediation cannot, alas, advice him on what to do best, but it can tell him what is simply impossible, what the alternatives are, and the likely consequences of opting for any specific one - which by way of predictive power for a theory of translation, I submit, is not all that bad! We can schematise the relationship between noetic content and linguistic form (LPI/F) as follows: In the overwhelming majority of oral or written speech acts direct intended sense determines linguistic form: LPIo > Fo; in the case of texts or utterances intentionally verbalised in a given, specific way sense and form determine each other mutually: LPIo Fo; in the remaining -very fewones, as in the case of Marechal’s exercise above, form determines sense: LPIo < Fo. Whenever the speaker chooses to impose upon himself formal constraints, he normally does it freely. Sometimes the form is selected beforehand (i.e. the poet decides to write a sonnet), sometimes the selection is more or less simultaneous (form “comes” spontaneously to him), sometimes the poet looks for an adequate form (viz. the strophe that Pushkin invents for his Eugene Oneguin), but once adopted, form begins to impose its own constraints upon an LPI (for instance the need to rhyme or eschew rhyming). This is why Dante must explain that “Non mi lascia più ir lo fren dell’arte,” which I could swiftly translate as “the bit of art will allow me to go no further” (“bit” in the sense of the iron bar that when pulled back by the reins forces the horse to stop: spontaneous comprehension of the English utterance is hampered by the semantic potential of “bit”, so that my translation is noetically less relevant than the original), but is that a line of English verse? If the aim were for the reader © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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both to understand and enjoy, the bit of art should bind the translator to manage some kind of poetic resonance. Once the synaesthesia of form and content is broken, there can be no aesthetic equivalence between the respective percepts. Robert Frost is said to have suggested that poetry is what gets lost in translation. Well, this is precisely what he must have had in mind: If the translator does not strive for an aesthetic verbalisation, his translation will not be homoscopic; and if he does, but does not manage, his translation will not be homofunctional - in either case it will cease to be literature. Dante says it black on white: the bit of art. To adopt a form is to choose to bite the bit (more effective than “mordere il freno” this time around), to give up on freedom - or, rather, to impose upon oneself the challenge of exercising it within strict restrictions. We can say that art lies, precisely, in the LPI moving so artfully and leisurely within the self-imposed formal constraints that it seems that form clothes it not as an armour but as a tight dress fitting a perfect body, stressing everything that is worth stressing and imbuing the reader with an irresistible impulse to bare this body that gives such voluptuous form to its garb; except that there are two basic differences between a writer and a translator: 1) Cum grano salis, we can say that the original poet chooses the form he submits to - he chooses the form that suits him best or that he fancies the most; he marries out of love or whim (poetic licenses are but the indiscretions that a poet indulges in while married to form). A translator has form imposed upon him, directly or indirectly, by the original writer. His is more of an arranged marriage and he signs a much more implacable fidelity contract. 2) As any original speaker, a poet says what he damn well chooses: he is the master of his LPI. A translator must assume -and sometimes also by contract!- somebody else’s LPI. The original is judged, we might say, horizontally, simply with respect to the relevant LPI (and, also, with respect to the other originals in its literature). We may like Dante’s Commedia or not. Some will be shocked that Dante says “culo” and others fascinated, but, in any event, we all agree that Dante is exercising his socially acknowledged right to say as he pleases. Literary translation, instead, is judged along two axes: As a translation - vertically: it is not a matter of whether a translator says “ass” himself, but of what he has Dante say. This vertical assessment is the translatologically relevant one, but there is also a horizontal axis: the relationship between Fi an LPIi (and, also, the place that the translated text, the new verbalisation, occupies in the target literature). Certainly, neither the translator nor the critic nor anybody else can ignore it, since it would mean nothing less than ignoring the social consequences of translation. Let it be clear, however, that there is an ontological and methodological distinction between the internal dynamics of the speech act -in this case, an act of translation- and its social consequences. So García Landa mostly refuses to exit translation and manipulationists mostly refuse to enter it who shall then save the theoretical day? Yours truly! - at least I hope.

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As I was saying, the translator has the formal features of his Fo directly or indirectly imposed upon him by the original author. Let me explain: The translator also chooses his bit (for instance, whether to keep or discard rhyme) as freely as any other mediator; but his form is never entirely “the one he damn well chooses.” The canonical verbalisation is there: not only what Dante said, but how he said it - because the original is both. Insofar as the target language allows, say, for a greater formal parallelism, a more analogous marking, all the more arbitrary will seem the formal differences indulged in by the translator. These obvious “deviations” force a translator ever more urgently to justify, explain or defend them in the face of critical readers who project upon Fi the especially semantic- template of Fo (like so many speakers who purport to follow their simultaneous interpreter - except that a sensible reader can do it with more justification, equanimity, wisdom, knowledge... and time). There is, then, a fundamental difference between the author’s writing and that of the literary translator that conditions and constrains the latter’s experience of literary writing: A poet, as we know, is always free to take liberties. Shakespeare abandons metre every ten or fifteen lines - even at his most sublime, as in Hamlet’s monologue: To be or not to be. That is the question. Whether it’s nobler in the mind to suffer The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune And by opposing end them. To die, to sleep...

Count them, my reader: there is an intruding syllable that wreaks havoc with the fourth iambic pentameter. Of course, Shakespeare is Shakespeare. The poet may do as he likes - but not the translator! Not, again, in the sense that the translatologically relevant adequacy of a literary translation is measured both against the relationship between LPIo and LPCi and that between Fo and Fi, i.e. both with respect to noetic identity and to formal equivalence. This latter relationship, may I stress, escapes translation theory proper, since it is co-opted by the theory of literary perception. As a matter of fact, it is not co-opted - it is gladly and humbly yielded. This yielding has social consequences: A literary translator is himself a sui generis mediator. Unlike his pragmatic colleague, who shines more through his ability to understand than by dint of stylistic prowess, a literary translator swims or sinks pretty much exclusively on his virtuosity at writing literature. Exactly as the original author, a literary translator glistens heuristically. That conditio sine qua non of all literary writing that a literary translator must meet with a handicap -he is swashbuckling, after all, with a hand tied behind his back- is what allows, or at times even advises, for a division between hermeneutic and heuristic, semantic and communicative, documentary and instrumental, overt and covert labour. In such cases, although liability for “translation” mistakes falls, of course, on the translator proper, the responsibility for the place that the translation occupies or fails to occupy in the target © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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literature lies entirely at the writer’s door. This is the key: a literary translator shares with any other translator the responsibility to understand and make others understand an LPI, but his responsibility does not end there (whereas that is the end of anyone translating a literary text with no wish to write literature): There it begins. It is not enough to make an LPI understood: it has to be made understood synaesthetically, combining cognitive and qualitative factors, matter and art. A literary translator is akin to a musician: a fully fledged artist, whose art consists in making accessible perceptions that “creative” artists have had first, in order to move his listeners as the original artist meant to (or, rather, as the performer himself was moved upon perceiving them). As we shall see a few pages down, translators offer us their versions of an LPI canonically verbalised by the author, in a way that is somewhat analogous to the versions each pianist renders of the Appassionata32. These versions are judged both with respect to their fidelity (musicological and emotional) to the original score and on the grounds of their own expressive and technical attributes. And the same way not just anybody who is able to read a score and play the piano can do justice to Beethoven, not just anybody who is able to understand the original and write in the target language can do justice to Dante33. Thus, the big difference between literary translation and other kinds of translation, which applies respectively to translators as well, is that literary translation is also an art. This “also” is crucial: literary translation, as every other kind of translation, is a discipline whose laws must be known in order to succeed at the hermeneutic task, but it is also an art that one must be adept at in order to be able to move through heuristic accomplishment. Back to our initial Magdalena text: Let us retain the LPI and ask a Cuban poet, Nicolás Guillén, to “transform” the Spanish version into art, to adopt for his Fo certain restrictions and, thereafter, taking advantage of the possibilities and hiding the limitations of the language, to enhance the aesthetic effects that LPI comprehension might produce, so that he may succeed at freeing himself from the formal straightjacket and render the much more effective qualitative effect of a perfect body tightly clothed. Sobre el duro Magdalena, largo proyecto de mar, islas de pluma y arena graznan a la luz solar. Y el boga, boga. 32

Again, the analogy stumbles against the fundamental fact that the different “reverbalisations” of the Appassionata produce first-degree -not second-degree- percepts, and, besides, in the same “language,” even in the case of transcriptions for a different instrument. 33

In this respect, the hermeneutic task of the translator proper and the heuristic task of the poet verbalising his LPI are not symmetrical: those of us who can appreciate a poem written in another language are many more than those who can do it justice in their own. 290

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El boga, boga preso en su aguda piragua, y el remo rema, interroga al agua. Y el boga, boga. Verde negro y verde verde, la selva elástica y densa ondula, sueña, se pierde, camina y piensa. Y el boga, boga. Va la gaviota esquemática con ala breve y sintética volando apática. Blanca la garza esquelética. Y el boga, boga. Sol de aceite. Un mico duda si saluda o no saluda desde su palo en la alta mata donde salta34 y chilla y suda. Y el boga, boga. ¡Ay, qué lejos Barranquilla! Vela el caimán a la orilla del agua, la boca abierta. Desde el pez la escama brilla. Pasa una vaca amarilla muerta. Y el boga, boga. ¡Puertos de oscuros brazos abiertos! Niños de vientre abultado y ojos despiertos. Hambre, petróleo, ganado. y el boga, boga.

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Try to “hear” this rhyme. Unless you make a contra natura pause it will be impossible. I became acquainted with this poem through a recording of it read by Guillén himself, which I listened to countless times before I actually bought the book. I only discovered the rhyme when I saw it in print. Only then, “reading the score,” did I “hear” the rhyme: it can only be perceived on paper. Now, when reciting the poem mentally, I make a very slight pause so as to perceive, mentally, that otherwise imperceptible rhyme. © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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El boga, boga sentado, boga. El boga, boga callado, boga. El boga, boga cansado, boga. El boga, boga, preso en su aguda piragua. Y el remo rema, interroga al agua.

What we have here is not a mere “versification” of the LPI but its poetic reworking, with an original articulation of phonomorphosyntactic, semantic and prosodic forms by dint of which the whole play of lights and shadows is modified, and, with it, that of all reverberations, connotations and weak implicatures. In this difference, and not simply -if also- that of metre and rhyme (which are perceived only acoustically), lies the big distinction between poetry and prose and, more generally, between literary form and that which is not deemed to be such35. Even so, according to the model I am propounding, I submit that we are always dealing with the same LPI verbalised in Spanish in two different ways, in literary prose and in verse36, and once in literary English prose. It is obvious that any formal constraint (metre, rhyme, collocations, register, etc.) will limit the possibilities of verbalisation - and open otherwise unsuspected possibilities. In this respect, as a translation not of the prose text 35

I am not going to go into a detailed analysis. The score helps to perceive the eight onomatopoeic g’s in “boga boga, preso en su aguda piragua, y el remo rema, interroga al agua, y el boga boga.” The ear has no trouble instead perceiving in the four proparoxytonic endings “esquemática/sintética/apática/esquelética” (which are very marked rhymes in Spanish) the indolent turpitude of time. These marks are not possible in languages such as English, that lack the liquid phone of the phoneme /g/ or proparoxytonic words with three long vowels. The noetic marks, instead, do not pose much of a hurdle in themselves: green that is green but also black, the elastic and dense jungle that undulates, dreams, disappears, walks and thinks, etc. 36

Except that, as far as I know, Guillén did not start by writing out the LPI in prose in order to versify it later striving to imitate a certain model. As we know, many translations are done like that: The poetically bereft translator produces a literal version (Fo(SmH) > Fi(SnH)) that allows for noetic identity between LPIo and LPCo, and a monolingual poet transforms Fi(SmH) into Fi(XnL,SnH,VnR,JnQ). The difference between this operation and the editorial polishing up that translations are normally subject to after they have been handed in to the client is just a matter of degree. 292

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(which it is) but of Guillén’s poem, the English verbalisation of the LPI is no longer poetically functional, precisely because it lacks the “formal clothing” (which, again, is not merely a post facto, independent ornamentation, but a symbiotic intertwining of F and LPI) that gives it poetic strength - i.e. that allows for the additional qualitative effects of LPI comprehension. Everything that we can say about the differences between the Spanish version in prose and the poem (which Jakobson would call “intralingual translation”) can be applied to the differences between the latter and the English version (i.e. to “interlingual translation” or translation proper). Insofar as both Spanish texts verbalise the same LPI, the English text functions as a translation of both. Insofar as the Spanish versions relevantly throw a different light upon that same LPI so that the emotive contextual effects of noetic comprehension are modified, the English text is more analogous, similar or equivalent to the Spanish version in prose. If the prose version in Spanish is thought to be less functional -i.e. relevant- than the original poem (for instance, because it is more pedestrian), then the prose version in English will also be less functional than the original poem. And if less functional means less apt - then it is definitely less apt! Let us pause to pose an interesting question: Nobody would find it strange if Guillén’s poem were to be translated into English in a version resembling the one above, but what would we say if the original had been this English text and Guillén’s poem its translation? In what kind of plausible situation would it be possible for such a madly free translation to be written and accepted? If the translation of verse into prose seems to be, if worse comes to the worst, a necessary evil, the translation of prose into verse is seen as a total distortion, almost as a mockery of the original. Let us remember what may be the only other more or less universal contemporary law of translation: A lesser degree of marking is accepted more or less without qualms, but hardly the opposite37. Most probably it is the same psychological principle that seems to push translators inexorably towards standardisation, generalisation and hypernymy. This latter trend -I do not think it counts as a real law, in that it very seldom is due to a conscious principle based on an analysis of relevant identity- clashes with its opposite: an equally a-critical trend toward explicitation, which in turn explains, as I have pointed out, the quasi-law that translations are longer than their originals. Now that we know which one is the original, let us try and transcribe it semantically, following the same criterion that guided our prose version:

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Some of us, conference interpreters, fed up with the inanity of certain speeches, play the game of imposing upon ourselves constraints that only we, the initiates, can perceive (so that our clients do not perceive the implicit mockery), such as introducing come what may certain words, or avoid others, or using as many proparoxytones as possible. I shudder at the consequences if we were ever to be caught! © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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On the rough Magdalena, Long draft sea, Isles of feather and sand Croak at the sunlight. And the oarsman - oars. The oarsman oars, A prisoner in his sharp canoe, And the oar, oars. It interrogates the water. And the oarsman - oars. Black green and green green, The jungle, nimble and thick, Undulates, dreams, fades away, Walks and thinks. And the oarsman - oars. The schematic seagull, With short and synthetic wing, Goes by flying apathetic. White, the skeleton-like crane. And the oarsman - oars. Oily sun, a monkey cannot decide Whether to greet or not to greet From its branch in the tall bush In which it shrieks and jumps and sweats. And the oarsman - oars. Oh, how far away Barranquilla! The cayman watches on the border Of the water, its mouth agape. The scale shines from the fish. A yellow cow floats by Dead. And the oarsman - oars. Ports With dark arms stretched out! Children of bulging bellies And eyes awake. Hunger, oil, cattle. And the oarsman - oars. The oarsman oars, Sitting, He oars.

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The oarsman oars, Silent, He oars. The oarsman oars, Tired, He oars. The oarsman oars, A prisoner in his sharp canoe, And the oar oars.It interrogates The water.

This semantic transcription (Seleskovitch would have despectively -and most legitimately so- call it transcodage) is no less faithful than the first version with respect to the Spanish prose text. How is it possible that the same method produces in one instance a perfectly acceptable result and in the other a monster? The answer, as noted above, is obvious: In the case of not all too marked narrative or descriptive prose, insofar as syntactic norms are respected and glaring literalisms avoided, an imitation of the semantic form often turns out to be a more or less acceptable vehicle for the LPI (at least in relatively similar languages such as those of the Indo-European family). It is but a statistical coincidence, due to the fact that in this kind of texts the semantic isonymy of both verbalisations is often almost absolute, as demonstrated by the translation of the prose text. If because often it can function passably (and never much more than that), the imitation of semantic form is adopted as a universal method, when dealing with more culturally and aesthetically marked forms, it fully reveals its impotence and dangerousness, as Nabokov’s slavish translation of Pushkin’s Eugene Oneguin will soon show: Whenever a semantic imitation actually vehicles an LPI, the nail is hit by chance (and this may well be a third truly universal law of translation!). Let us see, otherwise, what happens when the original language is “strange.” Seidensticker (op. cit.:144) transcribes thus a passage in a Japanese novel: “The I yesterday to you introduced from Osaka aunt tomorrow afternoon on the Sea Breeze Express is going back.” By Jove, it sounds almost as crazy as German! Let us now convey the LPI without catering to aesthetic features: Along the Magdalena river stretching out into the sea, the birds croak on their isles. The oarsman rows along in his narrow canoe while his oar slowly draws interrogation marks in the water. Both black and green, the thick and nimble jungle meanders away as if strolling, dreaming, and thinking... etc.

We have now ended up with an LP verbalised, with a greater or lesser degree of social acceptability and sanity, five times over, in two Spanish and three English texts: the original poem and its reduction to literary prose, plus the English translation in literary prose, the semantic transcription of the poem, and © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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the colloquial version above. How can we categorise them? Besides the semantic transcription, which, as we saw, hits the nail -when it does- by chance, we are left with four texts that are intentional verbalisations of the same LPI. Rigorously speaking, only the strictly interlingual differences are translatologically relevant, since to translate is not simply to say again (that, both Fos and all Fis do), but to say it in another language (as do the Fis). The differences between the texts in each language have to do with use and marking: they are aesthetic or literary - not translatological. Clearly, when translating, any discrimination of aesthetics is artificial, but aesthetic attributes, let me stress a thousand times, no matter how relevant at any and all conceivable levels, fall without the strictly translatological realm. It is important to keep it methodologically in mind, because heretofore these two kinds of analyses have been all too often randomly mingled - which has inevitably and unfortunately lead to a total divorce between translation tout court, on the one hand, and literary translation on the other, as well as between literary translation and translation theory. This is the double nature of literary translation qua interlingual literary mediation (which is none other than that of literary speech itself), which leads in actual fact to the social, academic and professional distinction between the literary translator and all other practitioners of translation. What interests me is what they have in common, but we cannot define it without taking as a reference that which rends them asunder. In this sense, if translatologically the Spanish versions share the level of an LPI expressed through two different chains in language o, from the standpoint of literary or aesthetic marking, the ones sharing the same level are, respectively, the versions in literary prose, even though they are in different languages. We can graphically represent it with the diagram below. Given a literary text in prose (FoLp) and another one in verse (FoLv), we have so far attempted three approaches - semantic transcription (Fis), pragmatic verbalisation (FiP) and literary verbalisation in prose (FiLp): METHOD

SEMANTIC TRANSCRIPTI ON

TRANSLATION

NONLITERARY

LITERARY IN PROSE

SOURCE LANGUAGE TARGET LANGUAGE

XX Fis

XX FiP

FoLp FiLp

IN VERSE ORIGINAL FoLv ??

As we can see, in the target language we have an empty square: this is the square to be filled by a poetic, ideally (in this case) metric translation (FiLv). If 296

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this square is left empty, the work will have been translated into the target language if there is an FiP (although an Fis is sometimes enough). A good translation into literary prose assures its passage to the target literature, but the target language poetry is, in actual fact, bereft of the work. That and no other is the reason why, as I noted, novel and drama “travel” better than poetry: in most literatures into whose language other literatures have been translated, the FiLp square is richly swollen, but not so that of FiLv. The wealth or poverty of this square is a direct reflection of the prevailing norm (always due to translators intentionally desisting from trying to translate metrically, most of the time due to their perceived or actual inability... Once again, praxis determines awareness.) In languages as dissimilar as Russian, German, and English (as well as, according to Etkind (1982), Hungarian and Rumanian), this square is much more and better populated than in French and, especially, Spanish - and not precisely because these languages do not lend themselves to poetry. Both the upper and the lower levels are a continuum. Given relevant noetic LPIo/LPCi identity, the relative place of Fo and Fi along such continuum will reveal the degree of formal marking of original or translated texts, and the relative place of both chains - the degree of original marking vis-à-vis a specific translation. Hedney’s and Musa’s English versions of Dante’s Commedia, which waive terza rima, are less marked than those by Anderson, Binyon, Sayers or Wilbur, who reproduce it. Even though it cannot but alter significantly the effects of comprehension, this fact, in principle, does not make those translations any worse or better, just less marked, at least prosodically, than the original (and therefore less representative of it, and, to that extent, therefore less relevant). My theory of literary mediation is nothing but the theory of the production of FiL, and here, as can be observed again and again, the noetic becomes entangled in the aesthetic, and the literary with the translatological. The step from the higher to the lower level is of translation, that from right to left - of literature - literary mediation synthesises both. The combo versions divide the work between translator tout court, who goes from FoLv to Fis or Fip, and that of the “literary editor,” who then turns Fis or FiP into FiLv - which is how so many opera libretti have been born. It is an artificial process, akin to machine translation (although its results can be splendid) that splits LPIo (Fo) comprehension and LPIi(FiLv) verbalisation through an intermediate Fis or FiP verbalisation in which the LPI is reduced exclusively to its noetic content and semantic form. The “literary editor” lacks the direct and spontaneous comprehension of the LPIo, whilst the translator - that of literary writing in the target language. It is a schizophrenic, but perfectly possible and common, way of translating (which, incidentally, proves the ontological distinction between LPI and F); one that can produce eminently acceptable results, such as Triolet/Aragon’s Oneguin, or even admirable ones, as is the case of Pasternak’s Hamlet, King Lear or Faust. Let us remember, by the way, that form, by definition, is a function of perception: only form perceived is such. This paragraph begins in verse: the first

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thirty syllables can be divided into three iambic pentameters (dreadful pentameters, certainly, but pentameters nevertheless38). Did you notice it? Is such form relevant? Now that I have mentioned it as a referent for the LPI I am trying to convey to you - yes, but how many “verses” are hidden in these pages? I have no idea. Will some diligent, obsessed and delirious translator search for them? I hope not, and, especially, that he does not strive to versify me in his translation! Indeed, if we can approach form from the standpoint of speech production, let us not forget that all we can access is comprehension, even of ourselves. A child can write poetry without being aware of it. One can write poetry unknowingly the way the primitive men who painted the walls of Altamira were unwittingly making art. Strictly speaking it is we who take the spontaneous expressions by children or our ancestors... or by poets themselves to be art (again, one is an artist only if others so decide). Bent upon translating a “poetic” Fo by a child, we assume an aesthetic intention that, most likely, the child did not have. In the case of literary works, instead, we know (or believe that we know) that there is an intention behind the form - and we therefore proceed to look out for its manifestations with a sometimes excessive zeal. At least two translators whom I know have detected in the beginning of Cervantes’s Don Quijote (“En un lugar de La Mancha de cuyo nombre no quiero acordarme” [In a place of La Mancha whose name I do not wish to remember]) an octosyllable and a hendecasyllable (if not a classic one, but a so-called “de gaita gallega,” with accents on the fourth, seventh and tenth syllables). How relevant is it? It is probable that many of the less obvious formal features of all literary works are not the product of a conscious aesthetic intention, but it makes no difference, since we cannot tell which ones were and which ones were not. As a matter of fact, once I finished the prose version of Guillén’s poem, I started counting syllables just out of curiosity and, lo and behold, it also begins with an octosyllable and a hendecasyllable (and this time around a classic one: Por el duro Magdalena, prólogo dilatado del océano...) On the other hand, we can never be totally certain that we have perceived every single relevant formal feature (relevant for the author or for a reader more sensitive and refined than ourselves). A translator, as I said, can hardly make perceptible more beauty than he himself perceives or reproduce more of it than he means to convey thereafter - even though it is always possible, as in the case of the author himself. What I am interested in, of course, is what can be done intentionally, which is the only thing that we can control and teach. In this respect, I submit that a) if behind, not of an LPIo (and even more so if that is the case), but of Fo, i.e. of the linguistic features of a text, there is an intention, and b) if the translator deems it relevant for his reader to perceive that intention on the basis of his LPCi, he then faces the problem of determining how to achieve this. Both in DTo and in DTi, author and translator impose upon 38

Let us remember, by the way, that form, / by definition, is a function of / perception: only form perceived is such. 298

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themselves specific constraints, i.e. a specific means that, in turn, is perceived as such by the reader. This gives rise in the latter to certain expectations, the fulfilment or frustration of which produces specific contextual effects, which, triggered by the noetic content of the LPC, produce the synaesthesia of aesthetic speech perception. Languages, cultures, literatures or traditions can offer similar means (such as the sonnet in Romance languages) that a translator can adopt, if he so wishes. At other times, as with the Persian rubay or the Japanese Haiku, it is not so. The means can be imitable, in which case the translator can chose to adopt it (which is how the Italian sonnet is nationalised by other literatures and Fitzgerald imports the rubayat). And it can also happen that the structural differences between languages themselves make any translation impossible: How to translate an acrostic into letter-bereft Chinese, or into Japanese, devoid of single vocalic graphemes, Rimbaud’s sonnet to the vowels? These specific constraints always exist, in fact; except that in the immense majority of pragmatic and, even, perhaps, literary texts, its relative importance goes unnoticed. As formal constraints are imposed upon ever smaller units, down to isolated morphemes and even sounds, however, the task relevantly to verbalise an LPI becomes more difficult. Such is the case with lyric poetry, advertisements and all manner of titles. Along the almost a thousand pages of David Copperfield a translator has more leeway to compensate or more space to spread out his losses. If he decides not to translate names (always semantically loaded, as in Chekhov), he can explain them in his notes, or simply renounce that specific effect without too much harm to the global effect of the whole piece, which lies much more obviously in the plot and the characters’ behaviour. Again, it is not by chance that a mediocre translation of a great novel goes less noticed than that of a great poem. In the theatre, a good actor can compensate with C and E for the formal inanity of Fi (Guillén’s poetry loses a great deal when deprived of the poet’s musical voice), but the imbrication of the formal and noetic spaces in concentrated units can make relevant translation -or, more strictly, mediation- impossible. Indeed, an LPI can always be reverbalised as LPIi, but LPIo/LPCi identity is formally achieved in such a poor way that it lacks any relevance. Ontologically, it is indeed still a translation, but a useless one. Naturally, one never knows what a translator of real genius will be capable of. Untranslatable works are like incurable diseases: untranslatable... so far. As Etkind puts it: “Peut-on traduire le Quatrain de Rimbaud ? A ce jour, en quelque langue que ce soit, on n’est pas parvenu à en donner une traduction à la hauteur de l’original ; cela ne veut pas dire qu’il y ait des raisons de principe pour que ce soit impossible. Henri Meschonnic remarque fort justement : “L’intraduisible est social et historique, non métaphysique... Tant que le moment de la traduction-texte n’est pas venu, l’effet translinguistique est un effet de transcendance et l’intraduisible passe pour une nature, un absolu” (op. cit.:xiv).

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[Can Rimbaud’s Quatrain be translated? So far there is no translation into any language equal to the original - but that does not mean that it is impossible as a matter of principle. Henri Meschonnic rightly points out that untranslatability is a social and historical fact, not a metaphysical one. So far as the moment of the translation-text is not come, the translingual effect is a transcendental effect, so that untranslatability is mistaken for an inherent attribute, an absolute.]

One should always bear in mind that no matter how closely all formal features are analysed, the beauty of the linguistic form (as that of the noetic content and the synaesthetic effect of both of them combined) is impossible to demonstrate objectively. We will always be speaking about a subjective percept -or series of subjective percepts- that is by definition inaccessible, as are the qualitative effects it produces. I was saying that if a translator cannot extract from Fo more of an LP that he manages to understand, he cannot extract more beauty than he perceives. On the other hand, exactly the same way that it is not enough to have understood an LPI in order to reverbalise it, neither is it enough to have perceived beauty in order to recreate it. In either case, however, we are dealing with the limitations of individual translators, not of translation. Those who assert that this or that poetic work cannot be translated relevantly do nothing more than record a presumed collective inability of all the translators who have tried and failed... or their own. One can never tell who will manage how, especially in view of the eventual evolution of the potential readers’ sensitivity and hermeneutic package. One thing is obvious: the abundance of stupendous metric translations into English, Russian or German and their relative paucity in Spanish or French has little to do with languages. It is enough to cast a glance at the few theoretical -even if impressionistic, a-systematic or unscientific- writings by Russian or English (and, I would, presume, German) translators to see that they tend to share a common view: The poem, the literary piece by the other, must become a poem, a literary piece for oneself - a literary translator too writes literature: What all these translators do, for the most part brilliantly, is practice what they preach. Let me finish this introduction to the general problems of literary translation by stressing that I am not detracting from the concept of identity. It is not -it could never be- a matter of showing, for instance, in English how well Pushkin handled Russian or Mafoud manipulates Arabic. This is more preposterous than trying to prove, with a transcription for the trumpet, how aptly Mozart wrote for the cello (after all, the listener can imagine the melody with a different timbre, since he would be dealing with a first-degree percept)39. To ask 39

Richard Eder resorts to an analogous metaphor in his review of Joseph Brodsky’s Nativity Poems as rendered by several translators: “Some of the poems in this book reflect Brodsky’s struggle with his translators, on whom he tried to press the sonorous drum of his Russian also, awkwardly, his rhymes and meters. English is a cello, and doesn’t take pounding. Brodsky’s own translation of... the “Lullaby” force-marches it. [Other] translations, by 300

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of translation that it reflect in the target language the formal features specific to the original language is simply absurd. One cannot write English as if it were Spanish or vice versa. To renounce, on the other hand, any attempt at reproducing -or, rather, re-creating- the aesthetic component with the excuse that “it cannot be done” is tantamount to saying that if Shakespeare had been a Spanish speaker he would not have managed to write his sonnets (or any of his other works, for that matter). What he certainly would not have managed to do or even thought of doing- is to handle Spanish as if it was English, as if it had a huge monosyllabic lexicon, forty phonemes, more than three endings for all its infinitives, etc. To write as if in English is something that only those who write in English think of40. How would the Bard have written his Hamlet in Spanish? Who can tell! What would the world be like were it not the way it is? That is not the issue. The issue is, in a literarily optimal case, to find an Fi that is the best possible Spanish verbalisation of the LP so admirably verbalised by the poet in English. That requires a genius of a translator, armed with extraordinary philological and encyclopaedic knowledge and, above all, with an adequate theory, because, as we shall see, it is not enough to be Nabokov, or to know as much as Nabokov, or to be able to write as Nabokov, or even to be able to translate as Nabokov, in order to translate a poet in a literarily functional (i.e. adequate - read relevant or, why not, apt) fashion: One must be, indeed, able; but one must also wish to translate in a certain way rather than another: One needs a certain theory of translation - albeit an unconscious or implicit one. The semantic representation shibboleth revisited Edmond Cary pointed out that when a normal reader reads, even literature, his ear sometimes stops at an unusual collocation, or hesitates in the face of a specific simile, but his own reading ends up dragging him. A translator, superb poets... seem, on the contrary, to free them and Brodsky,” (The International Herald Tribune, January 3, 2002:8). (I, for one, do not quite agree: Brodsky’s own translations including that of Lullaby- seem better than those by poets who, obviously, know no Russian and were working on the basis of intermediate translations.) 40

I cannot resist the temptation of the following musical simile, which despite its limitations and reservations, sheds light upon literary speech and its translation: the noetic content of an LPI is like the melody of a speech act, whilst its emotive relief would be its harmony and rhythm that make the melody sound gay, sad, euphoric, pensive, solemn or tragic. Such melody, harmony and rhythm can be reproduced by any linguistic orchestra (and there lies the repeatability of what has been said), but each language contributes its own specific resources, and it is the speaker (including the speaker who translates) who, according to his mood and ability, orchestrates the LPI using those resources idiomatically, or seeking to imitate with them those of another orchestra. And since all orchestras are different, not even the same orchestrator can achieve with one the same effects that he has managed with another. A literary translator must be, then, a virtuoso at (re-)orchestrating other people’ s LPIos, the Ravel of all Moussorgskis. © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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however, can never allow himself to be dragged by his reading. He never has the right simply to read: he must analyse each word with utmost depth, but without ever losing sight of the text that has dragged the normal reader. He must dig out the roots without disturbing the murmur of the foliage41. I think he is absolutely right, but sometimes, the translator risks becoming spellbound, like a hare by a rattlesnake, and end up mortally bitten. At the Fourth United Nations Seminar on the Theory and Practice of Translation, that unbelievable Shakespearean, David Snelling (1988:17 and foll.), explained that behind that simple word “question” in Hamlet’s monologue there is much more than meets the ear: “Question” is a lexeme stolen from the Normans, for whom, he said, “questioner” meant to interrogate in the legal sense of the times, with the purpose of extracting a confession - i.e. through torture. For Hamlet, to be or not to be is a dilemma that tortures him. I do not question Snelling’s proven and amazing erudition, but my theory leads me to pose a few questions. What about all previous and later instances of the word “question,” including my own immediately previous tokens, now that you know that I know about its lugubrious etymology? Was the Bard aware of this semantic past? Did the audience at the Globe Theatre perceive it? Do those who flock nowadays to the reconstructed hemicycle? Can any other foreign readers? Can the French themselves? And, above all, if it is not perceived -as I did not, nor probably did you yourself, dear reader- is the drama understood less or differently? Do the qualia of comprehension change that much? In other words, is it necessary to know -and grasp on the go- that double semantic meaning in order to understand the LP in its noetic and emotive aspects, and then to feel the relevant aesthetic effects? Is this etymological knowledge relevant for the relevant LPI/LPC identity the translator is after? For Snelling undoubtedly yes. For me, this kind of lucubration can only find its place, if at all, in footnotes, prologues and exegeses; and, to be honest, much as they may be relevant to philologists who can read the original, they tend to be a nuisance to all other mortals (as will soon be the case with “yes-s”/“no-s” or the principled uncle in Pushkin’s Oneguin). I do not think they count much for the relevant 41

“Vous venez d’entendre ces quelques lignes, peut-être votre oreille a-t-elle été accrochée au passage par tel mot insolite, telle image vous a-t-elle fait hésiter, mais la lecture du texte vous a emporté. Vous est-il arrivé de songer à celui qui ne peut jamais se laisser emporter par la lecture, qui n’a jamais le droit de glisser, qui doit sonder chaque mot jusqu’en ses profondeurs sans perdre pour autant le mouvement qui anime le texte et qui vous avait entraîné, heureux lecteur, qui doit fouiller les racines sans ternir le bruissement du feuillage nous avons nommé le traducteur” (1986:31-32). [You have just heard these few lines. Maybe your ear was caught on the go by this unusual word; maybe the image made you hesitate. Have you ever stopped to think about him who can never let himself be carried away when reading, who never has the right to glide, who must penetrate the very depth of each word without losing, however, the movement imbuing the text that has carried you away, happy reader; he who must dig up the roots without disturbing the murmur of the leaves? He is the translator.] 302

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reproduction of the LP in the new act of speech. After all, we can have the ambiguous Prince utter in Spanish “Ser o no ser. ¡He ahí el interrogante!” (after all, it comes from “interrogación”) and thus believe that we are faithful to the etymological relationship between “question” and “questionner,” but there is no explanation, no matter how scholarly, that will lead us to associate “interrogante” with the torture chamber - even after the long years of ferocious military dictatorships on both shores of the Atlantic ocean and the pious ministrations of the Holy Inquisition. The reason is simple: even if this specific etymological knowledge were a part of our encyclopaedic lore, if will hardly be activated merely by the stimulus of having the word uttered in that context. Let us remember that the knowledge base K, indispensable for comprehension, is not just the sum total of the knowledge we have accumulated over our lifetime, but that part that is activated at the right moment. At the moment of speech comprehension (tm+n), what cannot be or is not remembered is as good as if it were unknown (which is what happens at the theatre or in the simultaneous interpretation booth, where the only moment that exists is that one fleeting go at comprehension). This reading with a microscope is surely essential when indulging in literary criticism, but it can pose several dangers when translating42. The most apparent one is, precisely, to lose sight of the leaves that allow the tree to be perceived as such; but the greater one is that such momentary loss of perspective can blind a translator and push him into contresens -or even nonsense- as we will see shortly with the first lines of Oneguin that lured most translators into a trap. I am not denying its philological value; indeed, it may very well be that in certain instances (statistically few, no doubt - but that does not belie the general principle) it is essential for an optimum translation. What I am doing is warning about its risks and about its merely occasional and limited relevance. Moreover, this kind of philological obsession with the inner form of words can only find a place between related languages. Into Indo-European languages, the only modern translator to try and square the circle was, to my knowledge, Ezra Pound. As I have mentioned, it seems Lu Xun attempted something similar with his translations from French and other Indo-European languages into Chinese - not in order to achieve LPI/LPC identity but to make his own language more nimble, more apt at -as he asserted- expressing thought43. It is a completely extra-translational aim that many translators have had at key moments of the development of different languages44. The Bible translations by Luther and the turjumans convened by King James I contribute 42

See Allain (1988) for a scathing analysis of the dictionary addict psycopathology.

43

As explained by Pérez-Barreiro Nolla (1992) - one of the many cases in which the translator has his own extratranslatological, linguistic agenda. 44

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decisively to cement German and English. If philological seriousness -but never obsession!- is a perfectly legitimate end, strictly speaking, it has nothing to do with LPI/LPC identity, which is always the basic criterion to assess such translations as translations - i.e. as tokens of an LPI (which, in the case of the Bible is verbalised in different languages: there is no such thing as the original. To think that the monstrous hypostasis in our Western concept of translation, with its sycophantic “sacralisation” of the “original text” is the product of literal translation of an original that does not really exist as such, since it is the work of different authors, who lived in different places and wrote at different times in different languages!) Fine, but what do we do then with the dichotomy between LPI and Fo? An LPI, as we have seen, can normally be (re-)verbalised without much difficulty. Except that when its function is subordinate to an ulterior aesthetic intention, it is the latter that tends to dominate the relevant speech act. Thus the partial or total ineptness of the target language for verbalising relevantly that LPI is adduced. The most sensible alternative to expressing, with the same intention and with a view to the same or, rather, comparable effect, a different LPI... is to give up on translating. Again, noetic space is reproduced - form can, at best, be imitated. It stands to reason that such imitation will be the closer the more the relevant formal features of both languages converge. Relevant identity can never lie in any identity of the formal attributes of Fo and Fi (or of Cm and Cn, or Em and En), but in the synaesthetic effect of the simultaneous and combined perception of both the formal and noetic spaces. In view of the unavoidable and objective fact of the formal differences between the means of verbalisation, any translation cannot but differ from the canonic verbalisation of an LPI, i.e. from the original. This has four corollaries: As a rule, 1) the readers of the English and Chinese versions of aesthetically or culturally non-marked texts, such as the UN Charter, read different texts but understand an LP that is identical in all relevant aspects; 2) the readers of an original text that is aptly marked formally or culturally, such as a poem by Verlaine or a novel by Dickens, and those of an adequate translation read different texts and understand an LP that is identical in most relevant aspects, but not in all: canonical verbalisations tend to be more effective (since they are normally due to the great geniuses of a language, bent on and adroit at exploiting its advantages, and are, moreover, addressed to readers duly equipped emotively and hermeneutically); 3) readers of the canonical verbalisation of formally or culturally marked, but less effective, texts, such as a bad or badly written novel or a pragmatic text, and those of an adequate translation read different texts, understand an LP that is identical in most relevant aspects, but on the basis of verbalisations that often are more effective (since they are due to professionally expert writers); 4) readers of the originals and of recreations of advertisements -and, at times, of certain poems- read different texts, that can verbalise markedly different LPs, but as a function of an identical or relevantly analogous motivation and 304

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pragmatic intention. In other words, within certain objective linguistic and cultural limits, if the mediator is better than the author, his verbalisation will be better (more effective, i.e. more relevant) than the original, whether canonical or not. Indeed, it is theoretically possible and usual in practice that a translation be totally or partially better or more successful than the original - and, paradoxically, it will behove Nabokov himself to prove it, and with none other than the very Pushkin! Error in literary translation A model of literary translation, i.e. a conceptual architecture that strives to define the phenomenon’s constitutive rule or, if one prefers, its “felicity conditions,” establishes an admittedly fluid limit between a felicitous and an infelicitous translation. What counts, from this angle, as an error in literary translation? Since literary translation is but a form -the most complex and elusive- of translating, elementary translation mistakes, i.e. the absence of relevant LPI/LPC identity at the more basic propositional levels, will also count as errors in literary translation. Such errors are due mostly to comprehension mistakes on the part of the translator, except that sometimes they can be the product of negligence, and in other cases, more difficult to assess, they can also be due to the need to respect formal constraints, or to overcome censorship, or to other intentional motives. Then come errors that are no longer strictly translational, but mediational: they have to do with the new version’s comparability (not necessarily similarity or equivalence) vis-à-vis the canonic verbalisation - i.e. they would be mistakes from the standpoint of the adequateness or aptness of Fi with respect to Fo. A third category would be mistakes related to the aptness of Fi with a view to the place it is called upon to take in the target literature, intimately linked to the qualitative effects (in this case fundamentally aesthetic) of comprehension. Naturally, errors of the second and third order have to do with a translation’s acceptability as a fully fledged literary work, and to the way it represents the original in the target literature. They can be deemed to be such only when the translator’s or initiator’s aim is to import the piece into the target literature - for instance, that Goethe’s Faust exist in the target language, that it exist as a target-language incarnation of Goethe’s poem, saying what Goethe said and affecting its readers with the same aesthetic vehemence that it has in German, or in the good translations into other languages, such as Pasternak’s into Russian (a combo affair in which the great poet acted as versifier of an interlinear monster). There is an intermediate skopos - that of adaptation, in which the work is at once translated and re-written. In such instances, the translator consciously leaves aside any pretence that his translation “represents” the piece (i.e. that Fi be judged with regard to its comparability to Fo). Sartre both translates and modernises Euripides. Dryden’s translations of Horace are, in fact, English paraphrases. In this case, mediation in literature is akin to mediation in advertising texts, whose essential feature is © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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acceptability, whatever the propositional and formal price. Archetypical cases of literary translations subordinate to specific constraints that force the translator to disregard partially or totally any morphosyntactic or semantic similarities between Fo and Fi are those meant for the scene - especially if they are to be sung. In these instances, as pointed out, prosodic features, i.e. the singability or speakability of Fi, become decisive. The most obvious case is that of the adaptation of great works of “adult” literature for children. Gulliver’s Travels is a prime example. The translator becomes an active mediator an altogether modifies the very motivation and intention behind the original: the vitriolic political satyr that Swift set out to write becomes a jolly adventure for kiddies. In these instances, of course, “error” becomes a thoroughly elusive notion. As we know, the dialectic contradiction between a) the noetic and pragmatic requisites of LPIo/LPCi identity, b) the respective formal constraints of Fo and Fi, and c) the new coordinates of re-contextualisation in a new literary speech act in the target culture often lead to solutions that glide, at least in certain passages, towards adaptation or even non-translation (Gulliver for children lacks, as we had seen, two out of four travels). This objective fact makes ever so much more difficult the critic’s job, who must don at once three sets of spectacles of different gradation. This is what I shall strive to do next on the basis of several examples of the translation of poetry, which, by dint of being the most complex of all, is the one that reveals more comprehensively and closely each and every problem encountered in any kind of translation. Referring to the myriad juggling acts to which a translator of poetry is compelled when attempting to rewrite an original in another language, Arndt states: “It may be found that in such cases the light merely strikes another facet of the stanza; and the spatial sense of the reader may yet perceive, with luck, a refraction of the same jewel turned to another angle” (1972:XLIX).

That is, precisely, the relevant identity that I postulate: The same “object” of perception, but from different angles; so that, if translation has succeeded, in the end LPIo[=]LPIi. Arndt tells us about an interesting an illuminating experiment of his. He picked out at random a strophe of Swinburne’s Chorus of Atalanta and had it successively translated by several translator friends of his, first from English into French, then from French into German, next from German into Russian, and lastly from Russian back into English. Unfortunately, he does not quote the Slavic link, but the others are as follows: For winter’s rains and ruins are over, And all the season of snows and sins; The days dividing lover from lover, The light that loses, the night that wins.

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Car les pluies et les deuils de l’hiver ont cessé, Et le temps de la neige et le temps du pêché ; Les heures qui séparent l’amant de l’aimé, La lumière qui meurt, et la nuit couronnée.

For the rains and the mournings of winter have ceased, And the time of snow and the time of sin; The hours that separate the lover from the beloved’ The light that sleeps and the crowned night.

Denn Winterschauer, -trauer sind vergangen, Die Zeit, die Sünde mit dem Schnee gebracht; Die Stunden, da entrückt zwei Liebste bangen, Das Licht das stribt, und die gekrِnte Nacht.

For winter’s showers and mourning have passed, The time, the sins brought with the snow; The hours, two lovers removed, aching, The light that dies, and the crowned night.

For winter’s gusts and grieves are over, Snow-time weather and sun-time blight, Lone ache of lover for distant lover, The light that dies, and the throne of night.

Let us take a look at the unexpected things that have happened. First and most important, to my Hispanic surprise, no translator ever thought of translating in prose. They all went for a homoscopic and homofunctional translation. Second, whenever target-language poetic conventions were at variance with those of the original, the former are made to prevail, as can be seen from the twin alexandrines in the French translation. Third, none waived rhyme. As we see, despite the intervening transmutations, formally, Swinburne’s original strophe and its new English avatar are much more similar than one might have expected. Now there is something even more remarkable: The English original is in two iambic dimeters divided by a caesura (a rather unusual metre resembling an iambic tetrameter). The French text substitutes them with the twelve-syllable alexandrine (its typical metre). The German version opts for an iambic pentameter. It is likely that the Russian translator went for a iambic tetrameter (typical of Russian literature), although it is also possible that he retained the German metre. The fact is that between German and English the line returns to something remarkably similar to its original metric configuration. Insofar as all translators adopt the same initial norm, entropies seem minimal. If only one of them had changed the initial norm, the return to verse would have been practically impossible, for what translator thinks of translating prose into verse? That the four-times distilled English verbalisation is different from the original is not surprising: how could it be otherwise? And it is reasonable to assume, moreover, that the more the transmutations the further apart the new verbalisations would have been with respect to the original. If anything, what is really surprising is that the English reverbalisation is nevertheless remarkably close to the original: Although the English translator is presumably less talented a poet than Swinburne, his rewording is very much worthy in its own right. Had he been translating a foreign poet, his translation would have been a most welcome addition to the target language poetry. This cannot be a miracle. There is, I think, an obvious explanation: insofar as, when it comes to re-writing poetry

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in their target language(s), translators pursue the same method or strategy that the original author can be presumed to have adopted -i.e. if they pursue relevant identity on the basis of comparable aesthetic effect- then, and assuming an adequate literary ability, they are bound to produce translations that are also good imitations of the canonical verbalisation, that “represent” the original work in a manner that will allow it to be easily incorporated into the target literature. The greater the similarity between the relevant languages and traditions, moreover, the more similar will the different verbalisations tend to. Aesthetically, though, equivalence will not be so much a function of the similarity of languages and traditions as of the respective initial norm and talent of the translators. Now, whilst the likes of Lorca and Lope de Vega45 have been warmly welcome into, say, Russian literature, very few foreign poets, and definitely no Russian one, have made it into literary Spanish. The reason is simple: Spanish translations that establish relevant poetic identity are very, very few, and far, very far between. Let me show you another remarkable thing. Here is my literal Spanish transcription of the French translation: Que las rachas y penas del invierno han acabado, el tiempo de la nieve y el tiempo del pecado, Solitaria nostalgia del distante amado, la luz que muere, y el trono de la noche.

For the gusts and sorrows of winter have ended, the time of snow and the time of sin, Lonely longing for the distant lover, the light that dies, and the throne of night

Now this “translation” into Spanish, abjectly literal as it is, unexpectedly soars in the wake of the French text. As a matter of fact, all it takes to produce a perfectly acceptable translation is a tad more care, say: Que las lluvias y penas del invierno han cesado, y el tiempo de la nieve y el tiempo del pecado; las horas que al amante separan del amado, la luz que ya perece, la noche coronada.

For the rains and sorrows of winter have ceased, And the time of snow and the time of sin; The hours that separate the lover from the beloved, The light that now perishes, the crowned night.

We already have four Spanish alexandrines with their caesura, let us try to have them rhyme: Que las lluvias y penas del invierno han cesado, y el tiempo de la nieve y el tiempo del pecado; las horas que al amante separan de la amada, el día que perece, la noche coronada.

For the rains and sorrows of winter have ceased, Land the time of snow and the time of sin; The hours that separate the lover from the beloved, The day that perishes, the crowned night.

They are no lyric feat, but no doubt a better poet could turn them into good poetry.

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Shostakovitch’s haunting 14th symphony is set to poems by many foreign poets marvelously translated into Russian. Would the composer have chosen them had their translations been in prose? 308

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It is easy to see how Seleskovitch exaggerates when she asserts that the structural differences or similarities between languages have no impact on translation. It is true indeed that an LP is independent from the multiple verbalisations in which it can materialise, and that, methodologically, translation is always the perception of an LPIo and its reformulation as Fi, but when reverbalising it, the similarities between languages can save a lot of effort, especially to a simultaneous interpreter, who, besides, has Fo bearing down upon him with all its weight. The reverse danger is the trap of false similitudes, perennial source of interferences or, at best, the blinding effect of Fo that prevents the translator from taking advantage of his language’s specific resources. Indeed, the more the languages are alike, even if the danger of interferences is the higher, the more likely it is that the latter will not hamper understanding and even go completely unnoticed. Unlike an interpreter, a translator, even if he too is facing Fo, can force himself not to look at it, or to reread his own text once the original has duly perished from his memory. It is what I had to do in order to have my last couple of alexandrines above rhyme. Indeed, insofar as Fo subsists in or can return to memory, it will of necessity have a polluting influence (yet another candidate to universal law of translation!). The idea is to become aware of this fact and to try and avoid it entirely. Depending on the circumstances, it can be easier or more difficult and, in the booth, almost impossible. A dose of Pushkin I have decided to devote the bulk of my illustrations to that great master of universal poetry in the Russian language. I do so because I trust that most of my readers do not know Russian and will be forced to approach the different translations with the avid candour of a normal reader. Take my word that the originals are invariably true gems and that their semantic form is very similar to the ones I shall be recording each time. In other words, I shall be describing to you at every step the semantic ingredients of the original dish, whose taste you cannot savour, and I shall try and “explain” that flavour to you. I will then give you a plethora of translations into five languages and you will see how each verbalisation tastes. You will be able to do what translators and other bilingual readers can never do: read and judge the translations as literature. And since, besides, I am letting you peek at the semantic reverse and supplementing your hermeneutic package, you will also be able to assess them as translations. So that you will have your cake in one column and will be able to eat it off the other. Nabokov’s genial blunder In 1964, the author of Lolita, a most exquisite writer and one of the few truly bilingual ones (another great one was Beckett), published a seminal translation of the greatest masterpiece of Russian literature, Eugene Oneguin. It is a novel, but in verse (“a hell of a difference,” as Pushkin himself put it). For the purposes © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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relevant to our immediate communication, suffice it to say that the novel is written in strophes composed of fourteen iambic tetrameters (the most common Russian metre), with a complex rhyme scheme: AbAbCCddEffEgg, with the typical alternation between oxytonic and paroxytonic rhymes. The strophe is akin to an English sonnet, and is the product of an intense experimental search that took the poet a long time to complete. The first thing a translator has to do is to select his “initial norm,” i.e. to choose between throwing in the towel and going for prose, or adopting, himself, the formal constraints of verse (if not necessarily the same as the original’s). Whether any specific decision to translate in prose is justified or not, the unavoidable fact is that the representativity of the translation is dealt a lethal blow: There is simply no way that a prose translation, whatever its merits, can be granted citizenship in the poetry of the target language: Except for the few songs rendered in verse, Gerard de Nerval’s beautiful version of Faust has definitely elbowed its way into French literature, but not into French poetry. Let me make it crystal-clear, lest it be necessary: I am not saying that poetry is to be translated as poetry, or that prose translations are wrong. What I am saying, though, is that in the latter case the translator objectively relinquishes a decisive attribute for the representativity of his translation. Once the decision is made to translate metrically, on the other hand, the choice of metre and strophe pattern including rhyme- is the first problem now faced by the translator, since the constraints thus adopted must govern all heuristic solutions to all other problems. Translators into English have no major difficulty: they can adopt their own iambic tetrameter and start translating. We Spanish poets face a dilemma: our enneasyllable (the syllabic equivalent) is very atypical and tends to sound monotonous46. Both French (bereft of paroxytonic rhymes) and Italian (a pauper when it comes to oxytonic ones) are less apt than Spanish at alternating them; but regardless of its abstract possibility, such alternation is totally alien to Romance poetics. As with metre, the translator must decide whether he will strive to reproduce it (always with a view to a greater representativity of his translation) or discard it (so that his translation finds a more familiar place among analogous works in the target literature). It is impossible to determine in advance what is better. What can be said is that, once the bridges have been burnt, any lack of coherence will be marked in blood. In Russian, the first strophe sounds more or less so: Moj djádja sámykh chéstnykh právil, Kogdá nje v shútku zanjemóg, On uvazhát sjebjá zastávil, I lúchshe výdumat nje mog. Jevó primjér druguím naúka, 46

If you are conversant with Spanish poetry, try and remember a single Spanish poem in enneasyllabic verse. I can think of only one: modernist Rubén Darío’s Juventud divino tesoro.

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No Bózhe moj, kakája skúka S bolným sidjét i djen i noch, Nje otkhodjá ni shágu proch! Kakóje nískoje kovárstvo Poluzhivóvo zabavlját, Jemú podúshku popravlját, Pjechálno podnosít ljekárstvo, Vzdykhát i dúmat pro cjebjá ‘Kogdá zhe chort vozmjót tjebjá!’47

Since, as I said, I trust that Russian is Greek to you, dear reader, here is the semantic transcription: My uncle of most honest principles, When he fell sick in earnest, Forced to respect him, And better could not think, His example to others is science, But, my God, what a bore With a sick man to sit day and night Without moving away a single step! What a lowly perfidy Someone half-dead to entertain, His pillow puff up, Sadly to bring him his medicine, Sigh and think to yourself “When will the devil take you!”

How much would you pay me, my generous reader, to let you read the 500 remaining strophes? Could it not be said a tad better, more similar to the way we perceive that the original conveys propositional content? A sanitised version as we had come up with for the Biodiversity text could be: Now that my uncle, a principled old man, has fallen seriously ill, he could not think any better than to force others to respect him...

As we can see, all that is left of the poetic form is the misleading typographic layout (E). Nabokov did not mind at all. Here is how he reasoned:

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Did you really stop minutely to invoke the right sounds in your mind, dear reader? I am duty bound to come up with the aptest phonetic transcription possible (a few readers will indeed find this transcription relevant). But you choose to read what you want: If there was a mediator between us (just us: you and I), I bet you would have asked him no to bother you with useless stimuli.

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Can Pushkin’s poem, or any other poem with a definite rhyme scheme, be really translated? To answer this we should first define the term translation. Attempts to render a poem in another language fall into three categories: (1) Paraphrase: offering a free version of the original, with omissions and additions prompted by the exigencies of form, the conventions attributed to the consumer, and the translator’s ignorance. Some paraphrases may possess the charm of stylish diction and idiomatic conciseness, but no scholar should succumb to stylishness and no reader be fooled by it. (2) Lexical...: rendering the basic meaning of words (and their order). This a machine can do under the direction of an intelligent bilinguist. (3) Literal: rendering, as closely as the associative and syntactic capacities of another language allow, the exact contextual meaning of the original. Only this is true translation. We are now in a position to word our question more accurately: can a rhymed poem like Eugene Onegin be truly translated with the retention of rhymes? The answer, of course, is no. To reproduce the rhymes and yet translate the entire poem literally is mathematically impossible... In translating Eugene Onegin from Pushkin’s Russian into my English I have sacrificed to completeness of meaning every formal element including the iambic rhythm, whenever its retention hindered fidelity. To my ideal of literalism I sacrificed everything (elegance, euphony, clarity, good taste, modern usage, and even grammar) that the dainty mimic prizes higher than truth. Pushkin has likened translators to horses changed at the post houses of civilization. The greatest reward I can think of is that students may use my work as a pony’ (1981:viiix).

Nabokov does not aim at reproducing the LPI (he definitely manages to, of course, and that is why his translation is indeed one), only the morphosyntactic and semantic features of its canonic verbalisation -i.e. Fo(XmL,SmH)48- and that, I am afraid, is literally impossible: verbalisation can only be imitated. A translator wishing to produce in his readers an aesthetic effect analogous (never identical, alas!) to the one presumably felt by the readers of the original (but which ones? the poet’s contemporaries or the translator’s?) 48

Almost the exact antipode of the Zukofskys’ Catullus, in which they sacrificed morphosemantic form in the altar of phonoprosodic imitation. What allows us to call translations both Nabokov’s and the Zukofskys’ monsters is, precisely, LPIo/LPCi identity: total in one instance and basic in the other, but relevantly recognisable in either. The degree of relevance, of course, depends on whether the effects pursued by the translators tallies with those sought by their specific readers. The versions by Nabokov and the Zukofskys are, each, a marvel of cogency between ends and means, due in either case to the translators’ deftness. They cannot be judged as “good” or “bad” except from the standpoint of their execution. We can, instead, assess their literary functionality -or rather relevance- and, more strictly, their aptness as representations of the originals in the target language and culture. In any event, one thing is certain: despite their appalling semantic or phonetic “similarity” to the originals or, indeed, precisely because of it- their “literary similarity” is glaringly absent. Neither Pushkin nor Catullus wrote “like this.”

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must understand the LPI and imitate or recreate form; imitate it, not ape it, seeking the closest adaptation of Fi for the purposes of relevant LPIo/LPCi identity. In the belief that he is respecting the works “essence,” however, Nabokov ends up aping its semantic and syntactic form. Since Russian is not English, the imitation is necessarily imperfect. Since Nabokov is a genius, it is not too obviously so. Since semantic and syntactic form tend to be secondary, it matters little. Ironically, Nabokov does show us his true mettle: My uncle in the best tradition, By falling dangerously sick Won universal recognition and could devise no better trick...

only to tell us that this is nonsense, that it has nothing to do with Pushkin, because what Pushkin really “says” is: ‘My uncle has most honest principles: when taken ill in earnest, he has made one respect him and nothing better could invent. To others his example is a lesson; but, God, what a bore to stick by a sick man both day and night, without moving a step away! What base perfidiousness the half-alive one to amuse, adjust for him the pillows, sadly present the medicine, sigh - and think inwardly when will the devil take you?’

If this is all that Pushkin “says,” why is he supposed to be such a great poet? Be that as it may, in which sense is this latter version semantically better than Nabokov’s delightful “mockery” of the first four lines? In which sense does that wonderfully witty quatrain betray the noetic content of the original? Yes, there are semantic mismatches here and there, but would you have noticed, had you not been forewarned? If this is the kind of semantic price you must pay to read a version that you would enjoy, that would move you to tears and to laughter with the same story of the same characters told by an author as masterfully jovial, would you not pay it gladly? Is it so impossible to see from a different language the stupendous face of the carpet? Is it not, for all practical purposes, the same noetic plate verbalised in an aesthetically equivalent fashion, so that the target literature cannot but open its doors wide open to the newly arrived text? To my mind, this and no other is the supreme criterion in literary mediation - that which is literarily relevant. And it is not I who claims it, but all those readers of translations of literary works who have embraced some © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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translations and rejected or forgotten so many others: there are many English Rubayat, but only Fitzgerald’s has made it into the English literature (and, from it into Spanish, through an excellent -if unfortunately obscure- translation by XIX century Argentine writer Joaquín V. González). Unfortunately (!), I have not found a really bad metric translation into English, so let me inflict upon you my own into Spanish: Hombre severo y recoleto, hoy que de veras enfermó, mi tío exige gran respeto y nada más se le ocurrió. Hay para quien su ejemplo es ciencia, ¡pero, Dios mío, qué paciencia del viejo noche y día cuidar refunfuñando sin cesar! ¡Qué hipocresía tan mezquina al moribundo entretener, fingiendo pena sostener el frasco con la medicina, deseando en tanto con doblez ¡Si te murieras de una vez!

A stern and discrete man, now that he’s fallen sick in earnest, my uncle demands great respect and has been able to think of nothing better. For some his example is science, but, my God, what patience to see to the old man night and day protesting all the time; what petty hypocrisy to entertain one who’s moribund, feigning sorrow to hold the vial with the medicine, thinking meanwhile with duplicity Why don’t you die at last!

I hope you will agree that it is quite dreadful. Imagine, for starters, 6,000 enneasyllabic lines (remember that there is no such thing as an iambic tetrameter in Spanish) in a row and, as if that were not enough, teeming with puerile rhymes. Would you believe that you are reading the masterwork of one of the most exquisite poets and the one who most has contributed to develop and modernise a language as rich as Russian? No; it is almost better to have a modest semantic translation in more or less digestible prose that does not purport to be poetic - which is a rather lackadaisical compromise with what Nabokov asserted. He, the consummate master of two (or even four) languages, the obdurate philologist who couched the hundred pages of his translation in a thousand worth of notes and comments, he, who, mocking the poetaster translators, proffered as an example to be derided his own metric version. Except that it is this very version, more than any other I know, the one that, because of its masterful form, offers the best global representation of the original, a perfect symbiosis of the sensic space reproduced and the formal space imitated. Only a genius of Nabokov’s calibre -superb master of both languages, consummate philologist- could produce in a second language tokens of an LPI that are at the level of the canonical one. But no; Nabokov decided to remain “faithful,” and opted for a semantically close version that is a marvel of fidelity, but that, naturally, does not move. And a poetic work, original or translated, that does not move, whatever its exta-aesthetic merits, is like the submarine Spanish comedian Gila complains about in his monologue: ‘The painting’s OK, but it don’t float.’ I can imagine the poet rebuking his fellow countryman: ‘But if you 314

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love me so much, if you so admire my work, if you so enjoy my symbiosis of form and content, then why do you throw overboard this strophe that took me so much toil to invent and that I myself have not managed to make work since?49 Is that English (or Spanish, or Chinese, or Hungarian) language of yours so poor, so un-tame, so moronic that I could not have written in it anything worthwhile?’ Etkind complains bitterly: “Les poètes français ont renoncé à traduire en vers... en d’autres termes, ils se sont coupés de toutes poésies étrangères, leur coupant du même coup toute entrée dans la littérature française. Celle-ci s’est installée dans un isolement royal : elle n’a besoin de personne, elle règle tous ses problèmes en ne comptant que sur ses propres forces. ... Les universitaires ne voient dans la poésie ‘étrangère que des objets d’étude, des prétextes à érudition plus que des oeuvres d’art. Ils traduisent volontiers ; avec beaucoup de conscience professionnelle, ils s’efforcent de rendre le sens rationnel des poèmes étrangers, et les mettent sur le même plan que je ne sais quels textes cunéiformes étudiés par l’historien, par l’économiste ou par le juriste. Quelle importance que ce soit Mizkiewicz, Pouchkine ou Goethe, qui a écrit ces poèmes ? Le lecteur français n’en attend pas un plaisir esthétique ni un ébranlement de l’âme, mais des éléments outils, des données relevant de l’ethnologie ou de l’historie littéraire. Mais la poésie fournit peu d’informations, et bien moins que la prose. C’est pourquoi la traduction rationnelle, en prose d’information, d’un poème lyrique, ne laisse qu’un faible contenu sémantique. Ce contenu sans intérêt comme information concrète n’a rien à voir, non plus, avec la poésie, entendue comme art verbal.” (op. cit.:x) [French poets have refused to translate in verse. In other words, they have isolated themselves from all foreign poetry, it at the same time denying access to French literature, which has established itself in royal isolation: nobody needs anyone, it has solved all its problems by resorting to its own resources. Scholars do not see in foreign poetry anything but objects of study, pretexts for erudition more than works of art. They translate willingly; they strive, with full professional awareness, to convey what is rational in foreign poetry [García Landa would say its noetic plate, SV], putting it on the same level as the cuneiform inscriptions analysed by historians, economists or legal experts. What does it matter whether these poems were written by Mickiewicz, Pushkin or Goethe? A French reader does not expect aesthetic pleasure or spiritual commotion, but useful elements, data relevant to literary ethnology or history, but poetry offers few data, and many fewer than prose. That is why rational translation, in informative prose, of a lyric poem conveys but a weak semantic content. Lacking any interest as specific information, such content has nothing to do with poetry, understood as verbal art.] 49

How could Pushkin have imagined that, a century and a half later, in love with Johnston’s Onegin, an Indian author, Vikhram Seth, would also write a novel in vers, Golden Gate, using exactly the same strophe... And with splendid results! This is how a good (n.b.) translation manages to introduce in the target literature an unknown form.

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Except for a few most honourable and exceptional exceptions (as there are to be found also in French), his comments fit like a glove the translational norm prevailing in Spanish. Indeed, the less inept version to be published in this language, by Nina and Anatole Saderman, seems to follow the Nabokovian principle of throwing overboard everything that counts aesthetically, including, this time around, the typographic gimmick (but without being able to claim in exchange utmost semantic “precision”): ‘Mi tío, hombre de elevados principios morales, cuando cayó gravemente enfermo se hizo rodear de mimos y cuidados. No se le pudo haber ocurrido nada más provechoso y su ejemplo es, por cierto, altamente aleccionador. Pero ¡por Dios, qué fastidioso resulta tener que velar a un enfermo día y noche, sin poder uno apartarse de su lecho un solo paso! ¡Qué bajeza, qué felonía entretener a un semicadáver, acomodarle las almohadas, servirle con aire melancólico los remedios, suspirar ostentosamente, pensando para sí: el diablo te lleve de una buena vez!’ [‘My uncle, a man of high moral principles, when he fell seriously ill had himself surrounded by pampering and care. He could have thought of nothing more useful and his example is, indeed, highly instructive, but, by God, what a nuisance it is to have to see to a sick man day and night. Without being able to move one step away from his bed! How base, how treacherous to amuse one half dead, to puff up his pillows, to serve him his medicine with a melancholic air, to sigh ostentatiously, thinking to oneself: When will the devil take you!’]

As we can see, the translators refuse to submit to the bit of art, limiting themselves to tell us the story in pedestrian prose. It is, let me repeat, a possibility: barring an outright pragmatic blunder, only noetic LPIo/LPCi identity is deemed relevant; but if so, why add anything? If one cannot invoke lo fren dell’arte, whence “pampering” and “care” and so many arbitrary add-ons that end up distorting both the noetic content of the original and its intended effect? Let me clarify that the translators’ mother tongue is not Spanish, but Russian. In a personal communication, they admitted that in verse they “simply could not manage.” These translators let go of the bit of art not out of theoretical considerations but out of a clear awareness of their own limitations, not as translators, but as Spanish-language poets. Let me make it clear once again that according to the model I am propounding, translations such as Nabokov’s and the Sadermans’ are not literary, since their only aim is to imitate (and then awkwardly) the semantic form of the original verbalisation and reproduce the noetic content of the LPI. Neither Nabokov’s nor the Sadermans’ nor my own back translations are homofunctional (they do not function as poems) or homoscopic (they do not intend to). All the essential elements that Nabokov threw overboard -elegance, euphony, clarity, good taste, rhythm, rhyme and even grammar- are missing, i.e.

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all that which makes an act of speech a poem rather than a theorem. Or, as Etkind says of the French translation of Grigoriev’s Hungarian Dance: “Est-elle vraiment juste, cette traduction ? Oui, pour le sens. Ce qui manque, c’est une bagatelle : le chant. Et une autre : la blague” (op. cit.:34). [Is this a fair translation? Yes, with respect to sense. What is missing is a trifle: music. And another one: humour.]

Or as he states earlier on: “...On n’a pas affaire à une somme, on a affaire à un organisme : si on perd une partie, on exécute aussi le fond : un homme dont on a coupé la tête n’est pas simplement plus court d’une tête, il cesse d’exister” (ibid.:xi). [We are not dealing with a sum, but with and organism. If a part is lost, the whole is lost too. Believing that only form is being sacrificed, content is also executed. A man whose head has been chopped off is not simply a head shorter, he ceases to exist.]

Or, more rotundly: ‘Ils se contentent d’une paraphrase sémantique du poème, lequel ne manque pas de se transformer en son contraire, en antipoème... Des traductions de cette espèce ne rendent aucun service, au contraire elles causent un tort sensible : elles compromettent les grands poètes aux yeux du lecteur étranger’ (ibid.:xvii) [They are content with a semantic paraphrase of a poem, which becomes its opposite, its antipode. This kind of translation is no use. On the contrary, they do serious damage: they compromise great poets in the eyes of the foreign reader.]

I am going to be more indulgent and agree that, as Nabokov’s, translations of this kind can indeed serve a useful purpose, such as aiding a student or any other less proficient reader in exploring the original, but they cannot count as literature, not as a token of the poetic LPI that the original verbalises. This kind of translation can serve, then, a myriad purposes, except that of literary authors, which is to write literature, and that of literary readers, which is to read literature. Habeas corpus! As Chico Marx would have ejaculated: ‘So you wanna corpses? So I give ya corpses!’ Let us see what other translators have managed to do. I have consigned the available metric translations in chronological order. The first one, by a Lieutenant-Colonel Spalding, goes back to the late XIXth century (probably the first into English and one of the first ever), curiously gives the hero a French spelling: Eugene Onéguine, and follows the Gallic typographic conventions of © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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leaving a space before colon and exclamation and question marks. Together with Prall Radin/Patrick (1937) this translation calls the chapters Cantos, which I find most endearingly romantic - after all Pushkin was both imitating and mocking Byron: Spalding:

Prall Radin/Patrick:

“My uncle’s goodness is extreme, If seriously he hath disease ; He hath acquired the world’s esteem And nothing more important sees ; A paragon of virtue he ! But what a nuisance it will be, Chained to his bedside night and day Without a chance to slip away. Ye need dissimulation base A dying man with art to soothe, Beneath his head the pillow smooth, And physic bring with mournful face, To sigh and meditate alone : When will the devil take his own !”

“MY UNCLE’S life was always upright And now that he has fallen ill In earnest he makes one respect him! He is a pattern for us still. One really could not ask for more But heavens, what a fearful bore To play the sick-nurse day and night And never stir beyond his sight! What petty, mean dissimulation To entertain a man half dead, To poke his pillows up in bed, And carry in some vile potation While all the time one’s thinking, ‘Why The devil take so long to die?’”

Jones:

Deutsch:

‘MY UNCLE, honouring tradition When ill, from active life withdrew, Compelled respect for his position; ‘Twas quite the best that he could do. Example worthy emulating, But, bless my soul! how irritating To play the nursemaid night and day And never stir a step away! How mean and low, in posture humble. To entertain the half-alive, To straighten pillows, and contrive To bring his physic, never grumble, And, sighing, think but never say: The devil fly with you away!’

‘My uncle always was respected, But his grave illness, I confess, Is more than could have been expected: A stroke of genius, nothing less! He offers all a fine example, But, God, such boredom who could sample In day and night to have to sit Beside a sick-bed - think of it! Low cunning must assist devotion To one who is but half-alive; You puff his pillow and contrive Amusement while you mix his potion; You sigh and think with furrowed brow: “Why can’t the devil take you now?”

Falen:

Arndt:

‘My uncle, man of firm convictions... By falling gravely ill, he’s won A due respect for his afflictionsThe only clever thing he’s done. May his example profit others; But God, what deadly boredom, brothers, To tend a sick man night and day, Not daring once to steal away!

‘Now that he is in grave condition, My uncle, decorous old dunce, Has won respectful recognition And done the perfect thing for once. His act should be a guide for others; But what a bore, I ask you, brothers, To send a patient night and day And venture not a step away!

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And oh, how base to pamper grossly And entertain the nearly dead, To puff the pillows for his head And pass him medicines morosely While thinking under every sigh: The devil take you, Uncle: Die!’

Is there hypocrisy more glaring Than to amuse one all but dead, Shake up the pillow for his head, Dose him with melancholy bearing, And think behind a public sigh: Deuce take you, step on it and die!’

Johnston:

Elton/Briggs:

My uncle - high ideals inspire him; but when past joking he fell sick, he really forced one to admire him and never played a better trick. Let others learn from his example! But God, how deadly dull to sample Sickroom attendance night and day and never stir a foot away! And the sly baseness, fit to throttle, of entertaining the half-dead: one smoothes the pillows down in bed, and glumly serves the medicine bottle, and sighs, and asks oneself all through: ‘When will the devil come for you?

‘When Uncle, in good earnest, sickened (His principles were always high), My own respect for him was quickened; This was his happiest thought, said I. He was a pattern edifying; -Yet, heavens! How boring and how trying. To tend a patient night and day And never move a step away! And then -how low the craft and gross is!I must amuse a man half-dead, Arrange the pillows for his head, And bring, with long face, the doses And sigh, and wonder inwardly, ‘When will the Devil come for thee?

There is also a puzzling concoction by C.D.P. Clough: When Uncle took to his bed it was clearly going to be no joking matter (he’s a gentleman of the most punctilious principles). O yes, he’s made me respect him couldn’t have thought of a better way sets an example to the rest of us... by my God! what a bore it all is! Sitting with a sick man day and night not being able to step outside his room (the crafty bastard’s arranged it all) trying to amuse a near-corpse, shaking up his pillows every few minutes bringing him medicine with a suitable long face but inwardly sighing, privately thinking ‘When is the Devil coming to collect him?’ Thus a young tearaway, while in his chaise woke up the slumbering dust...

The first strophe segues into the second and then into part of the third. Then comes a narrative, and then some more admixture of strophes, and then some narrative and so on. Since I cannot fathom the translator’s skopos, I am loath to judge his effort. The middle verses sound a tad telegraphic, à la Alfred Jingle in Dickens’s Pickwick Papers. There is the unexplainable “the crafty © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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bastard’s (!) arranged it all” and an image I have grown fond of: “woke up the slumbering dust.” But I am totally puzzled at the sheer existence of this piece. Finally, there’s a bona fide prose version by Clarke: My uncle’s a man of most honorable principles; since he fell ill in earnest, he’s made people respect him - he couldn’t have thought of a better way. His example’s a lesson to us all... “But, God! - what a bore it is to sit by a sick man day and night, never moving a step away! What low dishonesty to try to amuse someone who’s only half alive, straighten his pillows, solemnly bring him his medicine, sigh and be thinking to oneself ‘Will the Devil never carry you off’?”

Let us now to French: Colin: Mon oncle, homme épris de morale, Venant de bon à décliner, Força l’estime générale Et n’eût su mieux imaginer. Plus d’un de lui pourrait s’instruire ! Mais, Seigneur Dieu, le dure martyre Q’un vieillard qu’il faut assister De jour de nuit sans s’absenter ! Quelle manoeuvre avilissante : Ces moribonds que l’on distrait, Ces oreillers que l’on remet, Ces drogues que morne on présente, Soupirant, pensant à part soi : “Le diable enfin veuille de toi !

My uncle, who took morality seriously, Going down for good, Forced general esteem And couldn’t think of anything better. More than one could learn from him! But, Lord God, the cruel martyrdom Of an old man one must attend to Day and night without leave! What a vilifying manoeuvre: Those dying men whom one distracts, Those pillows that one accommodates, Those drugs that ruefully one brings, Sighing, thinking to oneself: “The devil may at last take you!”

Markowicz: “Lorsqu’il se sentit bien malade, Mon oncle dit : “C’est le moment De ne plus faire d’incartade !” Admirable raisonnement ! Rien n’était plus facile à dire : Mais moi, je n’ai pas lieu de rire : Au chevet d’un malade assis Nuit et jour, qu’on a de soucis ! Et comment faire bonne mine ? Un moribond à surveiller, Lui redresser son oreiller, Lui préparer sa médecine... On ne peut faire qu’un souhait : “Oh ! si le diable l’emportait !…”

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“When he felt quite ill, My uncle said: “It is time To stop mischief!” Admirable reasoning! Nothing was easier to say: But for me it is no laughing matter: To sit at a sick man’s bedside Night and day, what a nuisance! And how to put on a pleasant face? To watch over one who’s dying, To puff up his pillow, To prepare his medicine for him, One cannot but wish for one thing: “Oh, if the devil just take him!...”

© 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

Legras: “Mon oncle, un parfait honnête homme, Quand son mal l’eut presque achevé Exigea le respect : en somme, C’est le mieux qu’il ait su trouver ! Qu’il serve de modèle à d’autres ! Mais, Dieu ! quel fardeau sera nôtre : Veiller l’infirme, jour et nuit, N’osant faire un pas loin de lui... Et quelle trahison bien laide Que de distraire un moribond, Lui rajuster ses édredons, Lui tendre, l’air triste, un remède, Et soupirer en “a parte” : “Quand l’enfer va-t-il t’emporter ?”

“My uncle, a perfectly honest man, When his malady almost had finished him off Demanded respect: in a word, It’s the best he could think of! Let him serve as a model for others! But, God! what our burden will be: Watch over the sick man, day and night, Not daring to take a step away from him... And what a perfectly cowardly treason To entertain one who’s half dead, To accommodate his covers for him, To bring to him, with a sad look, a drug, And sigh aside “When will hell take you?”

Meynieux: “Mon oncle aux meilleurs principes, “En tombant tout de bon malade, “Il force le respect d’autrui, “Et ne pouvait inventer mieux. “Son exemple est exemple à suivre : “Mais quelle corvée, ô mon Dieux, “De veiller auprès d’un malade “Le jour, la nuit, sans s’éloigner “D’un pas ! La méprisable ruse “Que de distraire un moribond, “Que d’arranger ses oreillers, “Le lui porter son remède “Avec une mine éplorée. “De soupirer et de se dire : “Quand donc t’emportera le diable ?”

My uncle has the best principles, Upon falling ill in earnest, He forces other people’s respect, And could not invent anything better. His example is an example to follow: But what nuisance, o my God, To watch over a sick man By day, by night, without going away One step! The despicable trick Of entertaining one who’s half dead, Of fixing his pillows, Of bringing him his medicine With a sombre face. Of sighing and saying to oneself: “When then will the devil take you?”

Backès: Mon oncle a d’excellents principes, Depuis qu’il se sent mal en point, Il exige qu’on le respecte. L’idée est bonne, assurément ! Et l’exemple sera suivi. Mais, Seigneur Dieu, quelle corvée ! Rester au chevet d’un malade Nuit et jour sans pouvoir bouger ! Et quelle vile hypocrisie ! On fait risette à un mourant, On redresse ses oreillers, On arbore un air lamentable

‘My uncle of excellent principles, Since he fell ill He demands that one respect him. It is a good idea, no doubt! And the example will be followed. But, Lord, what a torment To stay next to the sick man’s bed Night and day without being able to budge! And what base hypocrisy! To smile at the moribund, One puffs up his pillows, One feigns a sad expression

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Pour lui apporter sa potion ; Et l’on pense : qu’il aille au diable !

To take him his medicine; And one thinks: May the devil take you!’

Minor: Mon oncle, aux grands principes enclin, Quant il s’alita pour de bon, Força le respect de chacun. Ce fût sa meilleure invention. Brillant exemple pour autrui, Eh oui ! Mon Dieu, mais quel ennui, A un malade être attaché Et ne pouvoir s’en éloigner ! Vraiment quelle vilenie mesquine Que d’amuser un moribond, De lui arranger l’édredon, Lui présenter ses médecines Tout en pensant, par-devers soi, Quand donc le diable t’emportera !

My uncle, prone to elevated principles, When he fell irretrievably ill, Forced everybody’s respect. It was the best he thought of. A shining example to others. That’s right! But, my God, how boring To be tied to a sick man And not be able to step away! Really, what lowly villainy To entertain a moribund, To arrange his covers, To give him his medicines, Thinking, meanwhile, to oneself: When will the devil take you!

Bayat: “Mon oncle, aux plus honorables principes, du jour où pour de bon il est tombé malade, est mort, et n’aurait pu faire mieux. Son exemple - une leçon pour les autres ! Mais, Dieu du ciel ! quel ennui de rester nuit et jour auprès d’un malade sans le quitter d’un pas ! Quelle basse comédie que de distraire un moribond, avec un air de chagrin lui présenter sa potion, avec un soupir arranger ses coussins et, par-devers soi, murmurer : quand donc le diable viendra-t-il te prendre ?” [“My uncle, of the most honest principles, the day he fell ill in earnest, is dead, and could not have done better. His example - a lesson to others! But, God in heaven! what a bore to stay night and day entertaining one who’s half dead, with a rueful expression to bring him his potion, with a sigh to fix his cushions, and, to oneself, to mumble: when will the devil come and take you at last?”]

I also have a late XIXth century rarity by Wladimir Mikhailow: “Mon oncle, sur l’honneur, est un fort galant homme, “Si c’est pour tout de bon qu’il s’apprête à mourir; “Il fait preuve d’esprit et de vrai tact en somme, “Et c’est de cet instant que je vais le chérir. “Des oncles complaisants le plus charmant modèle ! “Mais Dieu ! Quelle corvée, oh !, l’assommant ennui “Auprès d’un moribond de veiller et jour et nuit ; “Se priver de repos, faire la sentinelle, “Soupirer et gémir d’un accent patelin, “Lui porter sa tisane, arranger son coussin, “Et se dire cent fois tout en faisant l’aimable : “Et, quand ce cher vieillard s’en ira-t-il au diable !”

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My uncle, upon my word, is a most gallant man, If it is for good that he’s ready to die; He shows spirit and real tact, in a word, And it’s at this moment that I’m going to love him. Of condescending uncles the most charming model! But God! What a nuisance, oh, the deadly boredom Over one who’s dying to watch day and night; To give up on rest, to keep watch, To sigh and moan with a mellifluous sound, To bring him his tisane, to fix his cushion, And to say to oneself a hundred times while pretending to be polite: Eh, when will this dear old timer go to the devil!

© 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

I have four Italian stabs as well: Pera: ‘Mio zio, un paragone di virtù, si è ammalato sul serio, e così si è fatto considerare; non poteva pensare di meglio. Dal suo esempio imparino gli altri; ma, Dio mio, che noia, stare giorno e notte con un malato, non allontanarsene di un passo! Che infima perfidia, intrattenere uno mezzo morto, aggiustargli i guanciali, porgerli tristemente la medicina, sospirando e pensando fra sé: quando ti acciufferà il diavolo?’

‘My uncle, a paradigm of virtue, Has fallen seriously ill, and thus Has he made himself esteemed; He could not think of anything better. May others learn from his example; But, my God, what a bore, To be night and day with a sick man, Not to take a step away from him! What a lamentable perfidy To entertain someone half dead, To puff up his pillows, To give him sadly his medicine, Sighing and thinking to yourself: When will the devil take you!’

Giudici: ‘Mio zio, che uomo tutto d’un pezzo! Quando davvero s’è ammalato, Per farsi usare rispetto Guarda cosa t’ha escogitato! Il suo esempio sia di lezione: Ma, Dio mio, quale afflizione Notte e dì un malato vegliare Mai un passo potendo fare! E quale perfidia meschina Già messomorto vezzegiarlo, Sui cuscini accomodarlo, Somministrargli la medicina, Sospirando e pensando fra te: Ti porti il diavolo con sé!’

‘My uncle, what a man of integrity! When he fell seriously ill, In order to make himself respected Look what trick he has played upon you! May his example be a lesson: But, my God, what a nuisance Night and day to take care of the sick man Never being able to take a step! And what a lowly perfidy Already half dead to caress him, To make him comfortable on his pillows, To give him his medicine, Sighing and thinking to yourself: May the Devil take you with him?!

Bazzarelli: ‘Mio zio, uomo dei più onesti principii, quando non per celia si ammalò, seppe farsi rispettare, e non poteva aver una migliore idea. Il suo esempio è insegnamento per gli altri; ma, Dio, che noia starsene giorno e notte con un malato, senza allontanarsi neppur d’un passo! E che bassa perfidia far divertire uno che è mezzo morto, rassettargli i guanciali, porgerli la medicina con volto triste, sospirare e pensare fra sé: ma il diavolo quando ti portera via?’ [‘My uncle, a man of the most honest principles, when he fell ill in earnest, he knew how to make himself respected, and he could not have a better idea. His example is a lesson to others: But, God, what a bore to be night and day with a sick man, without taking a step away! And what a lowly perfidy to entertain © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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someone that is half dead, to puff up his pillows, to give him his medicine with a sad expression, to sigh and think to yourself: But when is the Devil going to take you!’]

Lo Gatto: ‘Mio zio uomo di onestissimi principi, quando non per scherzo s’ammalò, seppe farsi rispettare, e non poteva inventar nulla di meglio. Il suo esempio è insegnamento agli altri; ma, Dio mio, che noia sedere con un malato e giorno e notte, senza allontanarsi di un solo passo! Quale bassa perfidia sollazzare un mezzo morto, aggiustarli i guanciali, tristemente porgerli la medicina, sospirare e pensare fra sé: quando dunque il diavolo ti piglerà!’ [‘My uncle, a man of the most honest principles, when he fell ill in earnest, knew how to make himself respected, and could invent nothing better. His example is a lesson to others; but, my God, what a bore to sit with a sick man night and day, without taking a single step a way! What a lowly perfidy to solace someone half dead, to puff up his pillows, sadly to bring him his medicine, to sigh and think to yourself: when will the devil take you!’]

In the early forties and fifties, there appear in Spain several prose translations by native Russians (one of them, anonymous): Alexis Markoff: Mi tío, que es hombre de muy austeras normas de vida, no ha podido hacer cosa mejor que caer seriamente enfermo para atraerse el súbito afecto de todos los que le rodean. Su caso podría servir de saludable ejemplo a muchos otros parecidos. Pero, ¡Dios mío!, ¡Qué fastidioso resultado estarse día y noche junto al enfermo, procurando distraerle, dándole medicamentos, arreglándole las almohadas y lanzando suspiros mientras se piensa: ¡Cuándo acabará por llevársete el diablo! [My uncle, who is a man of very austere norms of life, has not been able to do a better thing than falling seriously ill in order to attract upon himself the sudden affection of all those around him. His case could serve as a healthy example to many other similar ones. But, my God! What an annoying result it is to linger day and night next to the sick man, trying to distract him, giving him his medicines, fixing his pillows and proffering sighs while one thinks: When will the devil finally take you!]

Irene Tchernova: Mi tío, hombre de austeras normas de vida, al caer seriamente enfermo, se atrajo súbitamente el respeto de cuantos le rodeaban. ¡Que su ejemplo sirva a los demás de ciencia! Pero, ¡Dios mío, qué aburrimiento estar sentado día y noche con un enfermo, sin alejarse de él ni un solo paso! ¡Qué fastidio tan enorme divertir a un moribundo, arreglarle las almohadas, darle tristemente la medicina y suspirar y pensar: “¿Cuándo te llevará el diablo?”! 324

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[My uncle, a man of austere norms of life, upon falling seriously ill, suddenly attracted the respect of all those around him. May his example serve as science to the others! But, my god! How enormously annoying to amuse a dying man, fix his pillows, sadly give him his medicine and sigh and think: “When will the devil take you?”!]

Wisely anonymous: Al caer gravemente enfermo, mi tío, hombre de costumbres ejemplares, despertó como por encanto el respeto de muchos de cuantos le rodeaban. ¡Qué su austeridad sirva a todos de ejemplo! Pero ¡Dios mío!, ¡qué aburrimiento estar sentado día y noche a la cabecera de un enfermo sin apartarse de él ni un solo momento! ¡Qué fastidio tan enorme distraer a un moribundo, mullirle las almohadas, darle puntualmente la medicina y pensar: “¡Cuándo te llevará el diablo!” [Upon falling gravely ill, my uncle, a man of exemplary habits, arose as if by magic the respect of many of those around him. May his austerity serve as an example to all! But, my God! How boring to sit day and night at the bed head of a dying man, soften his pillows, punctually give him his medicine and think: “When will the devil take you!”]

To which the following, under the general directorship of Donna Teresa Suero Roca, Bachelor in Philosophy and Literature (sic!), (no translator blamed by name) is added: “Mi tío es un hombre que ha llevado siempre una vida muy austera y ahora, su súbita enfermedad, que puede revestir graves consecuencias, ha sido el mejor sistema de granjearse un repentino cariño e interés de todos aquellos que le rodean. Son muy frecuentes los casos parecidos a éste, pero el suyo podría servirles de ejemplo saludable. Pero ¡Dios mío, qué espantosamente aburrido y enojoso resulta permanecer junto al enfermo a todas horas, de día y de noche, buscándole distracciones, cuidándole y administrándole las medicinas, poniendo la cama en orden y suspirando a cada instante al tiempo que se piensa: “Ya podría llevársete el diablo de una vez.”!” [“My uncle is a man who has always led a most austere life and now, his sudden illness, which can entail serious consequences, has been the best system to earn a sudden fondness and interest on the part of all those around him. Cases similar to this one are very frequent, but his could serve them as a healthy example. But, my God, how dreadfully boring and annoying it is to remain next to the sick man at all times, by day and by night, seeking distractions for him, taking care of him and administering him his medicines, arranging the bed and sighing at every instant while one thinks: “The devil could well take you once and for all.”!”]

I have the nagging certainty that they all plagiarised Markoff (what the deuce for!) and then each other, which leads to Donna Teresa’s hilarious

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concoction. If you have skipped it, dear reader, go back and read it: it’s a gem (and don’t miss the punctuation havoc at the end)! I would like to think of these Spanish translations by Russians as a well-deserved retribution for Franco’s help to his mentor Adolph Hitler in the problematic Russian front. I have also had serendipitous access to a Spanish translation by a native speaker, for a change, José María Bravo (published in the former Soviet Union in the seventies or eighties), but it does not seem to make much of a difference: “A mi tío, hombre de los más rectos principios, No pudo ocurrírsele nada mejor, Para hacerse respetar, Que caer enfermo de verdad. Bien podría servir de lección. ¡Pero, Dios mío, qué fastidio Permanecer con un enfermo noche y día Sin alejarse un solo pase de él. Qué ruin perfidia Atender a un moribundo, Arreglarle las almohadas, Darle con cara apesadumbrada Sus medicinas y suspirar pensando ¿Cuándo te llevará, por fin, el diablo?

“My uncle, a man of most honest principles, Could not think of anything better, To make people respect him, Than falling ill in earnest. It might well serve as a lesson. But, my God, what a nuisance To remain with a sick man night and day Without taking a single step away from him. What a base evilness To take care of a dying man, To arrange his pillows, To give him with a sullen face His medicines and to sigh thinking When will, at last, the devil take you?”

And I have the latest effort of them all, in blank enneasyllabic verse (a novelty in Spanish poetics!) fresh from the press: a Spanish translation by Mijail Chilikov, also a native speaker of Russian who obviously has some trouble with Spanish: “Mi tío, un hombre honorable, sintiéndose desmejorado, se hizo respetar de todos. ¡Qué solución más acertada! Es un ejemplo saludable, mas ¡qué aburrido es, Dios mío, velar al lado del doliente sin apartarse, noche y día! ¡Qué pérfida hipocresía es distraer a un moribundo!, poner en orden su almohada y, suspirando tristemente, administrar las medicinas, pensando a un tiempo: ¡ojalá se te llevará ya el diablo!

“My uncle, an honourable man, feeling somewhat sick, made himself respected by all. What an apt solution! It is a healthy example, but, how boring it is, my God, to keep wake next to the ailing one without stepping away, night and day! What base hypocrisy it is to entertain a dying man!, to put his pillow in order and, sighing ruefully, to administer the medicines, thinking at the same time: I wish the Devil will take you!

From the standpoint of formal marking, regardless of the aesthetic merits and demerits of the different versions, a diagram of their distribution would be the following: 326

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METHOD ENGLISH

SEMANTIC PRAGMATIC TRANSC. PROSE Nabokov

Clarke

FRENCH

METRIC

Clough

Bayat

ITALIAN SPANISH

LITERARY PROSE

Bazzarelli My semantic concoctions

Bravo Saderman Markoff Tchernova Anonymous Donna Teresa

Lo Gatto my version in prose (below)

Johnston Falen Arndt Elton/Briggs Deutsch Jones Prall Radin/Patrick Aragon Meynieux Markowicz Colin Mikhaïlow Legras Minor Backès Giudici Pera My metric version Chilikov

From this essential fact on, literary judgements come in. In their case it is legitimate to determine which of these translations does more justice to the aesthetic perception derived from the formal features of the original, and, in order to do so, establish which features of Fi match which features of Fo. We can comfortably assert, I feel, that, even though a couple of the French metric translations are quite presentable, both they and, especially, the Italian versions are worse than the English metric translations, whilst all nine direct Spanish translations (Markoff’s, Tchernova’s, Anonymous’s, Donna Teresa’s, Bravo’s, the Sadermans’, Chilikov’s and both of mine) fail calamitously each on its own demerits. We can observe that the English semantic reverses of the original and its different versions reveal an objective phenomenon fraught with decisive consequences for translation in general and most particularly for the translation of poetry: the number of syllables being equal, English manages to fit (or cannot

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help fitting)50 much more semantic information than Romance languages and Russian. Let us now analyse the content of these verbalisations. Almost without exception, the translations evince problems with the first line: What do the uncle’s moral principles have to do with the fact that, having fallen ill, he forces other people to respect him? Absolutely zilch! As a matter of fact, it is the original itself that sounds “bizarre” (witness Nabokov’s daring introduction of the verb “My uncle has most honest principles,” which is as difficult to understand as the original Russian), As it happens, it is an intertextual allusion to a fable by Krylov, Russia’s Lafontaine, which begins, precisely, thus: “An ass of most honest principles...” Russian readers contemporary to the poet had no difficulty establishing the connection and inferring the not so weak implicature that Onegin’s uncle is, at least in his nephew’s eyes, a pompous ass. The seeming awkwardness of Fo is not so awkward after all, the poet counted on his readers activating their relevant knowledge and proceeding to the relevant interpretation. Foreign readers (an many of today’s Russian ones), however, cannot, because they neither know Krylov nor, even if they did, could establish the relevant intertextual nexus and associate the uncle with an ass on the basis of the explicature in the translated text (or, as I have pointed out, in the original itself). Once the allusion is lost, and with it the relevant association, the whole “principled” clause is an outright non sequitur. And once relevant LPIi/LPCo identity becomes impossible, the non sequitur puzzles rather than amuses. There are two real solutions: to avoid the non sequitur (off with the “principles”51, or to explain it, either in a footnote or in the text itself. The thing not to do, no doubt, is to leave the non sequitur as if it was intentional and, worse, inept, and have the reader blame Pushkin for the translator’s laziness or lack of acumen. All the more so at the very beginning of the piece, when the reader is putting together his expectations for the piece as a whole: imagine what an inauspicious first impression this produces. That is the reason for the explanatory note resorted to by most of the translators: it is meant to enrich the reader’s hermeneutic package. Except that it is one thing to learn after the fact and a very different one to perceive spontaneously - which is the way comprehension works and affects us every time. The note fulfils a function analogous to the verbal description of a visual image for the benefit of a blind person who cannot see it, as wittily suggested by Trabucchi52. The blind person will learn about the image, but will not be able to 50

Indeed, when translating from Slavic or Romance languages, English translators find that they have too many spare syllables, so that if they wish to maintain or imitate metre they must fill in.

51

Notice, by the way, that in his wonderfully witty stab at the first four lines, Nabokov omits both the “principles” and the “respect” hurdles to brilliantly relevant effect. 52

In his most witty vignette La traduzione (I volatili del Beato Angelico, Sellerio Editore, Palermo 1997:62-64), Trabucchi presents to us a couple of friends visiting an art museum. One of them is blind, so the other one “narrates” a painting for him (he transforms the natural, 328

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enjoy the percept. The old adage that an image is worth a thousand words does not begin to explain it: It is direct perception that is worth a thousand words: not only first-degree -i.e. the natural perception of a sound, an image, a flavour, a texture, a scent- but also second-degree, speech perception: the immediate and spontaneous grasping of meaning at all levels - aesthetic, pragmatic and noetic, semiosis by semiosis. That is the enormous difference between the immediate inference of the weaker implicatures as a result of the activation of relevant knowledge, and ex post facto clarification, between a joke and its explanation, between LPCo and a footnote. Every translator (except Nabokov, the semantomaniac) chooses to normalise the utterance syntactically (regardless of whether they later explain the imperceptible percept). As a matter of fact, the whole thing is no big deal: In defining communication through speech and, by extension, translation and, more globally, mediation, as a production of percepts whose success lies in relevant identity between intended and comprehended sense, my development of García Landa’s model allows us easily to detect the problem and, at the same time, to determine a) whether it can or cannot be solved by “translating” (i.e. by means of reverbalising the LPI), b) whether it is or not worth the price, or c) what can otherwise be done (compensate, omit, explain, etc.). On the basis of such a an analysis, an alternative to the non sequitur would be, for instance, “My uncle, quite a pompous ass...” - with the relevant footnote, if one so wishes, and the now useless explanation. How is it that none of the translators has understood it? As I had warned, I suspect that it is because of the semantic representation shibboleth. Another translation mistake which, I think, all translators departing from the semantic form of the original make, appears in the line: “he has made one respect him.” Except for Nabokov, they all interpret it as if Pushkin were having Onegin say -tongue in cheek, of course- that the uncle had forced everybody else to respect him. I think it is too literal a reading and, worse, totally out of character. First, the uncle (as we find out in the second chapter) lived alone with his housekeeper and hardly went out: He settled in that chamber where the rural old-timer with his housekeeper forty years had squabbled, looked through the window, and squashed flies. visual perception into a social, speech perception that he then verbalises in order to produce it in turn in his blind friend, who, blind as he is, can perceive it as well - exactly the opposite of what happened between Cartwright and his friend). Trabucchi strives to satirise translation. Of course the analogy is partly successful: There is no way that a translator can enable a reader who is both deaf and blind to Fo to perceive its attributes. He can, instead, reproduce for him the LPI, except insofar as the new Fi that the reader can perceive make manifest some of those features, the translated text does not even “narrate” the formal traits of the original, but the analogy stumbles against a decisive reservation: visual perception is, by definition, natural, and no speech percept can reproduce it in all its wealth. That is why, as I said, a picture is worth a thousand words. A Russian word, in the abstract, however, is worth neither more nor less than a Spanish or an English one. Incidentally, Trabucchi never actually mentions the paining described, but his description is evidently that of a celebrated Van Gogh. © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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as Nabokov puts it (except that in neatly mendacious lines). Whose respect could he have wanted to force and what for? But, above all, already in the second strophe of the first chapter we learn that Eugene is his only heir, who is musing in the post coach on the way to his uncle’s village. The moribund relative had obviously called him to keep him company during his last days (inheritance oblige!) - and now his nephew is returning to take possession of the estate (as a matter of fact, a Russian colleague has recently told me that “to make one respect oneself” did indeed mean “to die” - which makes eminent sense). This is the way I understand it and that is why my metric and prose versions below depart from everybody else’s. True, barring the idiomatic meaning, the semantic representation lends itself to both other interpretations, and besides, all thirty odd translators into four languages have interpreted the expression in a totally different way53; so I may be wrong. What do you think? One thing is clear: as Cary pointed out in a similar case: “Des mots et des expressions, des difficultés proprement linguistiques, nous avons imperceptiblement glissé à des préoccupations fort différentes. La langue, ici, est simple et dépouillée et ne présente pas des difficultés de vocabulaire et de syntaxe : les pièges sont ailleurs. Et il suffit d’une très rudimentaire expérience de la traduction pour reconnaître qu’il en est bien ainsi dans la quasi totalité des cas” (1986:34). [From words and expressions, from strictly linguistic difficulties, we have imperceptibly glided into very different concerns: Language here is simple and transparent, and it poses no lexical or syntactic difficulties. Traps lie elsewhere. A barely rudimentary translating experience is enough to understand that it is indeed so in well nigh all cases.]

True indeed; the English translators (at least much more obviously so than most of their other colleagues above), however, have a lot of experience translating. How is it possible that they have fallen into the trap? I think, of course, that it is due to the philological obsession, the word’s spell, that semantic flypaper adhered to which even the best practitioners die a sticky death. It has happened to me more often than I would be ready to confess, so I am in no position to throw the first stone. Now let us take a look at each effort: Elton/Briggs devote a whole line to the principles. The phrase in brackets becomes explicative, except that it does not explain anything at all; rather than becoming attenuated, the non sequitur is reinforced. We have here our first translation mistake proper. Another one (which, as we shall soon see, is repeated by many) is the shift in perspective: 53

Alone in the face of Fo, translators -as any other reader, including you now- have no choice but to infer the LPIo. In this case, it is obvious that my LPCo is different from that of my colleagues - and thus my translations differ too. 330

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with the gratuitous explanation (all in the name of rhyme!) “said I,” Onegin’s inner monologue becomes thus addressed to the reader. To begin with, it simply does not fit the situation: Thus a young scapegrace thought, with posters flying in the dust, by the most lofty will of Zeus the heir of all his relatives.

As we are told in the next strophe. Onegin is alone, and his monologue must of necessity be with himself. Otherwise, the character becomes distorted: Eugene is an introvert who would have hardly addressed a comment to an imaginary audience. Arndt offers us a fluid and idiomatic version that suffers from a couple of awkward fillers: his “brothers,” whose only reason is to rhyme with “others” (in literature it is always bad for such an effort to be noticeable) again turns the inner monologue into a public event. And “step on it and die” is, to me at least, a monumental anachronism: at the turn of the XIXth century there were no accelerator pedals (unless the idiom is older than that, in which case I must humbly eat my words). Johnston also proposes a fluid version, with two exceptions: The adversative “but” is out of place: what dilemma has presented itself between the uncle’s principles and the fact that he forced one to admire him? Still more awkward is “fit to throttle,” which screeches at every phoneme. Falen “enjambs,” the second and third lines and also has “brothers” rhyme with “others.” Not that enjambment is wrong, but that it does not duly represent the structural coherence of Pushkin’s poem, especially at the very beginning of the very first strophe, when the reader is just perceiving the formal attributes of Fi and structuring, in turn, his own expectations (after all, markings will be perceived as a function of such expectations). Jones leaps blithely over the difficulty in the first line (a stroke of genius of sorts) and, for once, hits a plausible mark with the problematic “respect.” On the minus side we have the many enjambments and rather artificially wedged in “in posture humble.” It is most interesting to see what the character as played by Ralph Fiennes does in his sister’s film: Onegin is there, before us (if riding in the snow rather than in the dust!), and therefore needs no description or explanation. This is what we hear him think: “Summoned to the sick bed... Oh God! The dying platitudes of the half dead. Arranging the pillows... The stench. All the time thinking ‘When will the Devil take him!’”

I find this a most effective “translation” of Pushkin’s iambic tetrameters for the screen. It fits the character and the situation to a tee - i.e. the scriptwriters (Peter Ettedgui and Michael Ignatieff) have undoubtedly achieved relevant LPIo/LPCi identity: action and image demand a thorough adaptation both of Fo and of LPIo in order to achieve the intended effects by means of the new medium (something analogous happens with the libretto that Modest © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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Tchaikovski wrote for his brother’s opera): In order to make the action plausible, the script writers renounce translating “literarily.” Let us now analyse form. Of those imitating the original strophe, Deutsch and Elton/Briggs are the ones most evidently departing from the original unnecessarily, as the other versions prove: theirs are by no means better poetically. Prall Radin/Patrick choose not to rhyme lines one and three, which deals a heavy blow to the rest of the strophe, since those two orphan lines are glaringly marked. Spalding is delightfully old fashioned - and much in the tradition of les belles infidèles, but it is not his fault. Clough’s befuddling stab is a blinding example of hyperactive overt mediation. Clarke is the only (!) English translator to go for prose (and he even gives up on assigning a separate paragraph to each strophe). You may wonder why, in view of the wealth of most acceptable metric renditions above. This is the way he explains his purpose: “Nearly all translators of Pushkin’s work have felt it to be their first duty to replicate the verse form of the original... But this presents two problems. One is that the untrained modern reader of English does not find narrative poetry, and particularly rhyming narrative poetry, as an easy or natural medium for literature that is both serious and readable. And secondly, the very difficult task of replicating in English the strict metre and rhyme scheme of a foreign original places constraints on the clear and accurate rendering of the subjectmatter...Over the last century or more there have been many translations of Eugene Oneguin into English, all more or less faithful to the verse form of the original. It is reasonable to assume that what can be achieved in this medium has now been achieved... It is. I believe, time for a different, thorough complementary approach... I set myself... to produce a version... accessible to the ordinary reader of English - not just the literary specialist, [and] to bring out as clearly and accurately... not only the meaning of Pushkin’s original, but all of its many qualities that in verse translations are subordinated to verse form. This might be summarised as presenting... Pushkin’s “novel-in-verse” in a way that, for the first time, gives the “novel” primacy over the “verse” (p. 232).

The skopos is impeccable in the abstract, except that there is very little novel to present - a fact that becomes most discernible in the film, where most of what little action there is, is not to be found in the original text at all. Be that as it may, we have three different approaches clearly stated by translators based on the interests and acceptability criteria of the readerships they address: Nabokov’s uncompromising semanticism is aimed at English-speaking students of Russian literature who do not need the translation to access the original and are not interested in its value as a representation thereof. Clarke’s conscious choosing of novel over verse caters to literarily unsophisticated readers of fiction, i.e. not to the community of poetry readers foreseen by de Beaugrande (1978). With the rather unclear exception of Clough, all the others address such a readership of initiates -which is, precisely, analogous to the one Pushkin himself wrote for- and they thus strive to “accommodate” the novel into the verse, as the poet did, and, not surprisingly, all adopt the same initial norm as he. 332

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Which, by the way, makes me wonder what the conceptual difference may be between the initial norm in the case of a translator as opposed to that of an original author - except for the fact that the former comes in later than the latter. I am not saying that the notion is useless -on the very contrary!- but I am saying that anybody who sets out to write or rewrite (or say or re-say) anything, adopts, whether consciously or not, an initial norm that helps build the reader’s expectations. The only difference between original authors and translators is that in the case of the latter, the relatedness of their norm to that of the source plays a role in the translated text’s value as a representation of the original in the target literature. Descriptivists and corpus fans, by the way, may have a field day checking the semantic isonymy/heteronymy of all the English versions. “Ljekarstvo,” for instance, breeds two “doses” (one singular and one plural), five “medicines” (three singular, two plural), two “physics,” one “potion” and one (vile) “potation.” You may also find seven “night and day” (all in rhyming position) and two “day and night” (one in rhyming position and the other one not), whilst uncle is “uncle” and that’s that. And now to the Continent: Colin, Aragon, Markowicz and Legras manage to imitate the strophe quite closely, including the oxytonic/paroxytonic alternation (which is not as perceptible in French as it is in Russian, but that cannot be helped). Meynieux’s, Minor’s and Backès’s verbalisations are extremely mediocre as translations and, to my ears, totally unacceptable as literature. I wonder why they bothered at all: after all Colin, Markowicz and Legras were perfectly available. Except for Mikhaïlow (and, of course, Bayat), the translators struggle to imitate the iambic tetrameter with the French enneasyllable, which, to my ears at least, does not quite work (as it does not in Italian or Spanish) - not repeated 6,000 in a row anyway. I am not, of course, a native speaker of French, so my judgement is not altogether relevant. Be that as it may, it is certainly possible that a master translator may do wonders with Pushkin in any language. Minor manages to reproduce the rhyme scheme (without the alternation between oxytonic and paroxytonic rhymes). As opposed to their colleagues, Backès either rhymes or doesn’t, whilst Meynieux gives up on rhyme altogether, which has the no mean merit of consistency. Mikhaïlow gives up on the Oneguin strophe and basically adopts the classical French Alexandrine. Like Spalding’s, his translation belongs squarely with the belles infidèles. The imposition of metre and rhyme restrictions ends up forcing all translators to write most unnaturally, something a good poet would never do - let alone Pushkin. Never really mind the coincidence of formal trappings: if the poet/translator cannot speak with the transparent naturalness of the poet/author, the translation suffers at its most vital: the level of literature. Aragon comes up with a rhyme that does not fit any which way one turns it: “ridicule”/“pilule.” Onegin’s complaint is not about ridicule, but about boredom (the perennial state of the Byronian hero Pushkin satirises)

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and about the hypocrisy that is forced upon him (indeed, his one redeeming virtue is honesty, as can be seen in his relationship with Tatiana). Legras’s also turns Onegin’s inner monologue into a public pronouncement. His selection of the passé simple in the first lines implies that the good old uncle is no more, which he is not - or is he? The somewhat incoherent “a parte” apart, the translation is otherwise quite relevant. Backès’s effort is neither good nor bad: it simply is. Bayat is the only one to give up on verse altogether, which ought to have given him a freer hand to be semantically faithful. The first thing that strikes me -and that, at first, I thought was a glaring translation mistake- is that his Onegin is not going to see his uncle, but returning from his funeral! Except that (Legras’s implicature aside) he may be the only one to have got it right (better even than Nabokov!) after all. Indeed, we are told in the next strophe that Onegin is the sole heir of all his relatives... Maybe he has already inherited and is now travelling to take possession of his uncle’s estate? Maybe he is evoking the price he had to pay to come into its possession? I must admit that the idea had not crossed my mind until I read Bayat’s reading. Indeed, Oneguin may be returning to his deceased uncle’s estate after having gone back to St. Petersburg to fetch his belongings, most especially those books that will so enthral Tatiana. In Pia Pera’s text incongruence becomes typographically visible. The strophe, of course, is not such: the division into lines makes sense only if there is a semblance of correspondence between each line in the original and in the translation, with the sole purpose of maintaining typographic symmetry (i.e. between Em and En) in a bilingual edition. Indeed, the edition is bilingual, with the original on the right-hand pages, but then what is “e così” doing teetering at the edge of the second line? Pera astutely avoids the problem in the first line. It is the one pious thing that I can say about her translation: her text is exasperatingly trivial. Giudici is the only one proclaiming to have striven to imitate the strophe. He concedes, however, that he has only managed occasionally and then some. Indeed, the metre is irregular and the rhymes contrived. If this is all his literary prowess, it is much better to give up and verbalise the LPI in prose, trying, at least, to make it decent prose: Simple prose is always preferable to awful verse. As in Pera’s case, the one kind thing I can say about this concoction is that it avoid, the trap in the first line. Bazzarelli and Lo Gatto choose not to lie and do not pretend to disguise their prose as poetry. They too avoid the initial trap, but their translations are insipid, odourless and colourless. All but one of the Spanish versions are by non-native speakers, a fact most painfully obvious in Chilikov’s effort, since it is the most ambitious of all. We may note the enormous semantic differences between these versions. There are omissions, accretions, shifts and modulations for every taste and distaste. At times, the changes are such that they distort the LPIo, so that the reader of the translation does not relevantly perceive it (as if he were looking at it through a 334

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glass darkly). On other occasions (as with the intertextual allusion in the first line), he does not perceive it altogether. Naturally, even though the analysis can be made at different levels, what really counts, in the end, is global identity. In this sense, all three later translations, including the execrable semantic backtranscriptions accompanying them, manage relatively well with respect to noetic content. From this standpoint, they are, all, translations of Eugene Oneguin; they all make possible -to a higher or lesser degree, with more or less elegance and neatness- that LPIo/LPCi identity distinguishing translation from non-translation (whether intentional non-translation or failed translation, which, in this case, is the same). As I had pointed out, there is the curious fact that of all English texts, Deutsch’s and Elton/Briggs’s are, at once, the most awkward and the ones most deviating from the original - which shows that fidelity to content and care for form are less at odds with each other than claim those who waive the latter under the pretext of the former. This does not mean that such is always the case, as the next paragraph will show, only that it is not as universal a dilemma as many tend to think. I have kept Marcowicz’s in abeyance not only because his translation of this particular strophe is, to me at least, by far the best into a Romance language, the only truly competent one, but because it is, also, the freest by far: the one in all languages not to start with “my uncle” - the uncle shows up only in the second line. Let us compare my literal translation of Markowicz and Nabokov’s of the original: “When he felt quite ill, My uncle said: “It is time To stop mischief!” Admirable reasoning! Nothing was easier to say: But for me it is no laughing matter: To sit at a sick man’s bedside Night and day, what a nuisance! And how to put on a pleasant face? To watch over one who’s dying, To puff up his pillow, To prepare his medicine for him, One cannot but wish for one thing: “Oh, if the devil just take him!...”

‘My uncle has most honest principles: when taken ill in earnest, he has made one respect him and nothing better could invent. To others his example is a lesson; but, God, what a bore to stick by a sick man both day and night, without moving a step away! What base perfidiousness the half-alive one to amuse, adjust for him the pillows, sadly present the medicine, sigh - and think inwardly when will the devil take you?’

In all, only seven semantic correspondences: “uncle,” “ill,” “sick man,” “night and day,” “pillows,” “medicine” and “devil.” Yet I hope we agree that both the Markowicz’s and my English re-translation thereof are, indeed, bona fide translations of the same original. If not semantic overlap, what do these two translations and their original have in common that we may call them translations? How much of a criterion is then semantic correspondence or even

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isonymy when it comes a) to decide that translation is indeed such, and b) to assess it? You know García Landa’s answer to the first query: identity between meaning as originally meant and meaning as finally understood - in that light they are, both, translations. And you know my answer to the second one: relevant identity between the twain, which includes the best or aptest possible correlation between intended and achieved effects. In this respect, only the French text is a literarily relevant translation - in this respect, then, it is undoubtedly the better one. Marcowicz’s effort also helps explain why most other translations into Romance languages quoted here are so dismal: they fail to free themselves from the semantic shackles, which prevents them from a modicum of idiomaticity let alone literary quality: you simply cannot write in Romance languages the way you can in Russian or in English. What you can do, rather, is try and reverbalise according to the new limitations and new possibilities offered by the new semiotic instrument, striving to produce in your readers a relevant perception of the LPI by means of an adequately articulated Fi. This may and may not mean any degree of imitation of Fo - it all depends on the similarities between the respective languages and literary traditions, and on the specific purpose of the translation. Markowicz chooses (and I fully agree with him in this specific instance) to do his best to imitate the original strophe. Indeed, it is part and parcel of the relevant features of the original, and in those languages that can imitate it, its absence will be perceived as sorely marked. This limits the numbers of syllables at his disposal. He knows that it is statistically impossible to fit the same amount of semantic material into the same number of French syllables. So he does not even try! And what does he choose to leave out: those blasted “honest principles” that derailed most of his colleagues, the “forced respect” clause that fits so uncomfortably in most other versions, the “nothing better could invent” that can be dispensed with without relevant loss... As if he had read my tirade on the need to compress and abstract (Viaggio 1992). So simultaneous interpreting and the translation of poetry are not so far apart after all! May I add a specimen in Catalan by Xavier Roca-Ferrer54. I, myself, know no Catalan; the reason I am quoting this particular translation is because it offers a most interesting solution to the first line problem, while also solving most handsomely the noetic puzzle. Alas! It is still bereft of poetic functionality: “L’oncle -com el ruc de la faula- és un home de principis, i en posar-se malalt de debò s’ha guanyat els nostres respectes. Segurament ha estat la cosa més entenimentada que ha fet en la seva vida. Serveixi en això d’exemple als altres! Però, Senyor, i que n’arriba a ser d’avorrit cuidar un malalt nit i dia sense gosar allunyar-se’n dues passes! Quanta hipocresia cal per fer-li la gara-gara 54

Unfortunately, when I became acquainted with Roca-Ferrer’s translation this book was already on its way to the publisher, so that I cannot delve into it the way it deserves. 336

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amb un somrís llagoter als llavis quan ja és mig de l’altre món, apilar-li coixins sota el cap y servir-li els remeis amb cara de circumstàncies, tot desitjant-li entre sospirs: Que el diable se t’emporti!” [“Uncle -like the ass in the fable- is a man of principle, and upon falling ill in earnest he has earned our respects. Surely it has been the most sensible thing he has done in his life. Let this be an example to others... But, Lord, how boring it becomes to take care of a sick man day and night without daring to take two steps away! How much hypocrisy is needed to pamper him and with a fawning smile in one’s lips, when he is already half in the other world, puff up the pillows under his head and administer him his medicines with a sultry face, while you wish among sighs, ‘May the devil take you!’”]

Roca-Ferrer adds the kind of note I, personally, appreciate the most from my fellow translators: “In the first line of the poem, Pushkin quotes almost literally a very popular fable about an ass by Russian poet Krylov. In order to keep the original’s humour and bearing in mind that our public has not been educated with Krylov but with Aesop, Fedre, La Fontaine, Iriarte and Samaniego (if at all), we have deemed it apt to refer in the text to the “ass in the fable” [p. 55, my translation]

Yet another interesting point is the way Roca-Ferrer’s explains his decision to go for prose: “It is] perfectly acceptable, to my mind, a recreation in prose that, abandoning Nabokov’s strict, scientific and didactic literalism -ideal for scholars but perhaps not so much for those who read pour le plaisir- is capable of conveying an approximate idea of the merits of the piece. This is what I have tried to do. Let us say I suggest a game to you: imagine that Pushkin, who was, as well, an exceptional writer of prose, wrote Oneguin in prose, as he wrote The Queen of Spades or The Captain’s Daughter, and that this Oneguin has been translated into Catalan” [ibid.]

Roca-Ferrer’s explanation of why he went for a prose translation is most interesting: “Now, whilst Oneguin has a wonderful music for those fortunate ears that are able to hear -and understand!- it in Russian, it is not a Mahler symphony, a Bach suite, or a quartet by Beethoven. We mean to say that it is not only music. What Pushkin tells us also counts -and a lot- as does how he tells it to us. On the other hand, quite often the tone of the lines is remarkably colloquial and ironic - i.e. antipoetic. As pointed out by Falen, “The hybrid nature of Oneguin -a novel in verse- belongs to a transitional period in Pushkin’s career and becomes a bridge of sorts between two literary epochs. Even though written in verse, it is Pushkin’s earliest work to contain clearly prosaic elements, both with respect to his motivation and to his spirit.” That, to my mind, makes perfectly acceptable a recreation in prose that, eschewing Nabokov’s strict, scientific and didactic literality -ideal for scholars but © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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perhaps not so much for those who read pour le plaisir- manages to convey an approximate notion of the piece’s merits. And that is what I have striven to do. Let us say that I am proposing a game to you: let us imagine for a moment that Pushkin, who was, also, a writer of exceptional prose, wrote his Oneguin in prose, and that this Oneguin has been translated into Catalan. I have kept the strophe numbers thinking of those who wish and can follow the original text or a good metric translation. In the latter case, I would recommend Johnston’s English version. [ibid.]

Before abandoning this strophe, let me try a prose version that reflects with some naturalness what Pushkin verbalises in lines worthy of a great master: “When he fell ill in earnest, that pompous ass of an uncle of made the wisest decision: kicking the bucket. His example should be a lesson to others; but, my God, what a nuisance to attend a sick man day and night without being able to move one step away! And how dastardly to entertain someone who’s already half dead, to puff up his pillows, to bring him his medicine with a languid face, sighing and muttering to yourself ‘When will the devil take you!’”

This translation is methodologically akin to the one I had suggested for the text on biodiversity (i.e. it is not, nor does it purport to be, poetic). It reads comfortably (which, as we have seen, is no mean merit), but I need not stress the point that art is more than elementary reading comfort. A translation such as this one might, if at all, be functional in the case of a traditional novel, say Le père Goriot, where aesthetic effects are produced almost entirely by the noetic space, by plot, situations, characters, i.e. by what is said rather than how it is said. Oneguin, however, is no such novel - nor are Ulysses or -heaven forbid!Finnegan’s Wake. Rummage, dear reader, through these translations. The one telling you the closest to this the most aesthetically effective way, without elevating or lowering register, without resorting to syntactic contortions, with a lexicon as simple and as precise, without adding unnecessary detail, so that the image is clothed in metre and rhyme the way a body is enhanced by the dress covering it... that translation is the best one. That is the one that, like the original, manages most matter with most art. That is the one that achieves the highest degree of relevant LPIo/LPCi identity as a representative of the original in the target polysystem. Insofar as they distort, spoil or overload the image, insofar as it is obvious that the translator bends backwards in order to respect the strophe or any other formal constraint, all others will be worse. Let us proceed to strophe VI, in which Pushkin goes on painting his portrait of Onegin, about whom he has told us that he has received an education typical of the young aristocrats of his generation, beginning with French tutors; his hair is cut after the latest fashion and he dresses like an English dandy. He speaks and writes fluent French, dances the mazurka gracefully, and knows how to bow naturally. This is enough to earn him the admiration of elegant society. 338

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Of course, as Pushkin tells us, in his world everybody has somehow had a bit of schooling in something, so it is not hard to pass for a cultivated man. Onegin was, according to many keen and severe judges, a miniature scholar - if a bit of a pedant. He had a happy talent for chatting naturally about any subject, keeping silent with a knowledgeable expression during a serious discussion, and making ladies smile with the spark of his unexpected epigrams. Now he adds: Latýn iz módy vyshla nynje; Tak, jésli právdu vam skazát, On znal dovólno po latynje shtob epigráfy razbirát, potolkovàt ob Juvenále. v kontsé pismá postávit ‘vale’, da pómnil, khot nje bjez grjekhá, iz Eneídy dva stikhá. On rýtsja nje imjél okhóty v khronologícheskoj pylí bytopisánija zjemlí, no dnjej minúvshykh anjekdóty ot Rómula do náshykh dnjej khraníl on v pámjati svojéj.

Latin is now out of fashion; In fact, to tell you the truth, He knew enough Latin To make out epigraphs, Chat about Juvenal, Write vale at the bottom of a letter, And recalled, if not quite flawlessly, A couple of lines from the Aeneid. He had no inclination to rummage In the historic dust Of old chronicles, But a few anecdotes of bygone days From Romulus to our present time He did keep in his memory.

Which Nabokov (as I have just done, but with exasperatingly more obsessive precision) renders thus: Latin has gone at present out of fashion; still, to tell you the truth, he had enough knowledge of Latin to make out epigraphs, descant on Juvenal, put at the bottom of a letter ‘Vale,’ and he remembered, though not without fault, two lines of the Aeneid. He had no urge to rummage in the chronological dust of the earth’s historiography, but anecdotes of days gone by, from Romulus to our days, he did keep in his memory.

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Again, we have several versions to compare: Minor: Le latin est passé de mode. Vous dirai-je la vérité ? Il savait assez de latin Pour déchiffrer une inscription, Parler un peu de Juvénal, Mettre vale dans une le translatore Et citer, mais non sans erreur, Deux ou trois vers de l’Énéide. Il n’éprouvait aucune envie D’aller se plonger dans l’histoire Ou la poussière des chroniques ; Mais il avait à la mémoire Des anecdotes du passé De Romulus jusqu’à nos jours.

Latin is now out of fashion. Shall I tell you the truth? He knew enough Latin To make out an inscription, Talk a bit about Juvenal, Put vale in a letter And quote, but not without error, Two or three lines from the Aeneid. He had no wish To plunge into history Or in the dust of chronicles; But he had in his memory Anecdotes of the past From Romulus to our days.

The translator manages to fit semantic form in enneasyllabic lines, but she ends up, I think, writing awkward prose (awkward, precisely, because of its regular pattern). And why should Pushkin confess that Onegin knew some Latin? Backès: Le latin est passé de mode, Et pour vous dire la vérité, Il en savait encore assez Pour déchiffrer les épigraphes, Pour discuter de Juvénal ; Et finir ses lettres par Vale. Il connaissait, mais de travers, De l’Énéide deux ou trois vers, Et ne montrait aucune envie De fouiller la chronologie Des us et moeurs de la planète, Mais il retenait dans sa tête Chaque anecdote, fait amusant, De Romulus à notre temps.

Latin is out of fashion. And to tell you the truth, He knew enough of it To make out epigraphs, Chat about Juvenal; And end letters with Vale. He knew, but not quite well, Two or three lines of the Aeneid, And evinced no wish To leaf through the chronology Of the habits and mores of the planet, But he kept in his head Each anecdote, funny thing, From Romulus to our time.

Here we have, half imitated, the strophe. What whim may have impelled the translator sometimes to rhyme and sometimes not to - I don’t know. There is, besides, a passage in which, regardless of form, he radically changes the LPIo (not that he does not understand it, since it is obvious that he has no problems with Russian). Onegin knows enough Latin to mention Juvenal, but not to discuss with alleged connoisseurs. He is a dilettante, so there is simply no way 340

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that he can know -let alone remember- “every anecdote” of the last two or three thousand years. Of course, this “each” is to be taken cum grano salis: The sense intended is not the literal one, but the objective sense to which “each” remits the reader is “many,” and Onegin knows but a few. Pushkin says simply “anjekdóty,” in the plural, which, in the absence of a determinant, can be understood as all, many or few, but the character is to remain coherent. If the poet had deemed it indispensable to mark -or had metre or rhyme forced him to do so- I bet he would have said “some,” “certain,” “occasional” or something in that vein. Another derailment between LPIo and LPIi comes next: There is nothing “funny” about the fact that Onegin remembers anecdotes, if at all, he probably remembers funny anecdotes (the semantic potential of “anjekdóty” comprises both anecdote and joke). Both stumbles end up sending the reader stumbling down, since they are consistent with each other: indeed, how bizarre that Onegin, who knows what he knows rather flimsily, should remember each and every anecdote from history! This is an obvious translation mistake, a betrayal of LPIo, i.e. one as a consequence whereof the reader of the translation does not understand -or, worse, misunderstands- what the author meant to say. If the translator invoked the excuse that the formal constraints he had assumed left him no other choice, I would retort that indeed he had, that if he had worked harder and more aptly, he most certainly would have found a better one, as did all others. Legras: Le latin est passé de mode : Eugène, à ne vous rien celer, Savait (outre, par cas et modes, Une épigraphe démêler) Parler de Juvénal - et mettre “Vale”, à la fin de ses lettres ; De l’”Énéide”, aussi, par coeur, Citer deux vers, non sans erreurs... Fouiller, du pays de l’Histoire, La chronologie fatras, Ce plaisir ne le tentait pas Mais il gardait en sa mémoire Les “ana” des temps révolus Jusqu’à nous, depuis Romulus !

Latin is gone out of fashion: Eugene, to be honest with you, Could (besides, by case and modes, An epigraph to make out) Speak about Juvenal - and put “Vale” at the end of his letter; Of the Aeneid, too, by heart, Quote two lines, not without errors... Leaf, of the land of History, The jumbled chronology, This pleasure did not attract him But he kept in his memory The “ana” of bygone times Up to our days, from Romulus!

I find this version disjointed. Except those “ana” stored in the Oneginian memory, there are no translation “mistakes,” but it is not enough. I find “outre, par cas et modes, un épigraphe démêler” both unnecessary prolix and awkwardly wedged in.

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Colin: Le Latin parait vieille chose. Pourtant, pour ne vous rien celer, On le voyait en virtuose Mainte épigraphe démêler, Ou bien gloser sur Juvénal, Parapher un vale final, Citer, bien qu’un peu de travers, De l’Énéide au moins deux vers. Pour lui n’avait aucun attrait La chronologie poussière Des annales de notre terre. Mais dans sa tête demeurait Mainte anecdote du vieux temps De Romulus aux jours présents.

Latin seems to be an old thing, Yet, to be honest with you, He could be seen like a virtuoso Many an epigraph to sort out, Or descant on Juvenal, To sign with a final vale, Quote, if not quite right, Of the Aeneid at least two lines. He found no attraction In the dusty chronology Of the annals of our earth. But in his head there remained Many an anecdote of olden times From Romulus to present days.

This is a very nifty rendition: everything seems to fall neatly and naturally in its place. The “en virtuose” adds a deft ironic touch, perfectly within Pushkin’s approach to the character. “Parapher un “vale” final” glides freshly into the line. I find “anales de notre terre” with its double meaning of earth and land particularly successful. My only quibble is the repeated “mainte” - a pity, since I am sure it could easily have been avoided. But, in all, this is the first time Pushkin really shines through in French. Markowicz: Le latin ne s’apprend plus guère ; Il n’en avait, en vérité, Qu’une teinture fort légère : Il pouvait lire un mot cité, Parler d’un auteur satirique, Dire “Vale !”, salut antique, Répéter, plutôt de travers, De l’Énéide un ou deux vers ; Mais, quant au reste, il n’avait cure Des livres d’histoire anciens : Ce goût-la n’était pas de siens. Il leur préférait la lecture D’anecdotes ayant eu cours De Romulus jusqu’à nos jours.

Latin is no longer taught, He had, in truth, But a very light smattering of it: He could read a quoted word, Speak about a satirical author, Say “Vale!,” an ancient greeting, Repeat, rather askew, Of the Aeneid one or two lines; But, for the rest, he cared little For ancient books of history: This was no among his tastes. He preferred to them reading Anecdotes having taken place From Romulus up to our days.

The last time I had visited this strophe, I wrote: Markowicz makes all the concessions that I hinted at in analysing Aragon’s translation: no more epigraphs, no more Virgil, no more end of a letter, no more chronicles, no more dust, no more memory... you name it! These concessions, to my mind, do not relevantly affect LPIo/LPCI identity: they do 342

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not change the character as seen by the poet. I particularly like the first quatrain, and most especially that incisive “teinture fort légère.” My quibbles are with the patronising “salut antique” that ruffles my sensitive feathers the wrong qualitative way. Also, and this is the one point where Markowicz’s Oneguin differs from Pushkin’s, Eugene did not “prefer” reading anecdotes. As a matter of fact he preferred not to read history at all! These anecdotes cling to his sophisticated brain like barnacle, but not as the result of any serious effort on the hero’s part. So Markowicz makes two translation mistakes: he makes the poet patronising towards his reader and the character a keener scholar than he is.

As I leafed through previous drafts, however, I stumbled into this indictment: Here, the irony is all but lost: If we are told, in so many words, that Onegin had but a light smattering of Latin, all the following information bears out rather than contradict the initial premise and becomes all but irrelevant. Our intelligence is further insulted when we are denied the benefit of the doubt and are duly informed that “vale” is an “ancient greeting.” The “ancient books of history” don’t quite fit, and no, Onegin did not prefer to read anecdotes at all: that was all he could remember of the books he had to read at school. In order uncomfortably to meet form, content becomes crucially distorted. No Pushkin here.

Yep! There is an inescapable and decisive element of subjectivity in all judgement on matters artistic: I cannot believe that it was also I who, not that long ago (a few months) was chastising the quatrain that I now find so amusing. Does this in any way torpedo my concept? Not at all, thank heavens! Relevant identity is always ad hoc: Sergio Viaggio the First did not like this strophe as much as Sergio Viaggio the Second. I am glad, however, that I have stuck to my guns in both second halves. So where do I stand now that I have heard both sides? Somewhat in the middle: I agree with my first schizophrenic self in that the irony is lost. But I also agree with my second self in that the quatrain reads very well on its own merits. In other words, as a translator, Markowicz fails relevantly to convey Pushkin’s viewpoint, but as a writer, he succeeds in putting forward most aptly a different point of view. His is a better piece of French literature than it is of translation. Bayat: De nos jours le latin est passé de mode, mais, à ne vous rien cacher, il en savait assez pour déchiffrer des inscriptions, pour discuter de Juvénal et à la fin des lettres écrire vale, se rappeler, mais non sans faute, deux vers de L’Énéide. Il n’avait pas de goût pour remuer la poussière de l’histoire, mais dans sa mémoire conservait les anecdotes des temps jadis, de Romulus jusqu’à nous jours. © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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[Nowadays Latin is gone out of fashion, but, to be honest with you, he knew enough to make out inscriptions, to discuss Juvenal, and at the end of his letters to write vale, to recall, but not without error, tow lines from the Aeneid. He had no taste for shaking the dust of history, but in his memory he kept the anecdotes of bygone times, from Romulus to our days.]

Now if prose unshackles noetic content, why say “inscriptions” rather than “épigraphes” and have Onegin remember “the” anecdotes (i.e. all of them) of the past two thousand years? Little can be said for this prosaic prose rendition. Its only trouvaille is in having altogether omitted the problematic “chronologic annals of the earth” or similar nonsense. Now we grapple the Italian verbalisations: Lo Gatto Il latino adesso è uscito di moda: così, se debbo dirvi la verità, egli sapeva abbastanza di latino per decifrare le epigrafi, commentare Giovenale, alla fine di una lettera mettere vale, e ricordava, sebbene non senza errori, un paio di versi dell’Eneide. Egli non aveva gusto a frugare nella polvere cronologica della descrizione storica della terra; ma gli aneddoti dei giorni passati, da Romolo ai nostri giorni, li conservava nella memoria. [Latin is now out of fashion: thus, to tell you the truth, he knew enough Latin to make out the epigraphs, comment on Juvenal, put vale at the end of a letter, and remembered, although not without errors, a couple of lines from the Aeneid. He took no pleasure in rummaging in the chronological dust of the historic description of the earth; but the anecdotes from bygone days, from Romulus to our days, he kept in his memory.]

According to Lo Gatto, Pushkin admits as if reluctantly that his Onegin’s Latin was not altogether solid. Not at all: the original clause is concessive, not explanatory. This mistaken explanation is compounded, besides, by the Latinist we are next presented with, who knows enough Latin to make out “the” -i.e. allepigraphs and to “comment” on Juvenal. Not in a million years! Onegin might, if at all and then laboriously, make out a few epigraphs and, so tells us Pushkin, he managed to “chat” about Juvenal, whilst the verb “to comment” shows us more of a scholar than a dilettante. Lo Gatto’s hero also remembers “the” anecdotes, not just a few. At the formal level, once all limitations that Pushkin imposed upon himself have been disregarded, repeating “Latin,” the third person pronoun and “days” is as inadmissible as it is uncouth. “The historic description of the earth” borders on the preposterous: this description is closer to geology than to history.

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Bazzarelli: Il latino è oggi passato di moda: così, se devo dirvi la verità, egli sapeva di latino solo quanto bastava per decifrare un’epigrafe, per dir due parole su Giovenale, per mettere vale alla fine delle lettere; ricordava poi, non senza qualche errore, un paio di versi dell’Eneide. Non aveva alcun desiderio di frugare nella polvere delle cronache della terra, ma teneva a mente gli aneddoti dei tempi passati, da Romolo ai nostri giorni. [Latin is now out of fashion: thus, if I am to tell you the truth, he knew only enough Latin to make out an epigraph, to say a couple of words on Juvenal, to put vale at the end of letters; he also remembered, but not without some mistakes, a few verses from the Aeneid. He had no wish to rummage in the dust of the chronicles of the earth, but retained in his mind the anecdotes of past times, from Romulus to our days.]

Bazzarelli adds mistakes of his own: Onegin knows “enough,” not “only enough.” The irony between the seemingly positive explicature and the negative implicature, left for the reader to metarepresent, vanishes. If those “chronicles of the earth” are slightly less outlandish than Lo Gatto’s “historic description of the earth” or than the “earthly historiography” with which Pera is awaiting us, this Onegin is also a Mr. Memory of historiographic trivia. Again, once the translator decides to reject formal constraints, he loses any excuse to modify relevant details of an LPIo. What formal extenuating circumstances can Bazzarelli or Lo Gatto invoke to turn Onegin into a history aficionado or to water down the irony with which his scant Latin is presented to us? Pera: Ormai il latino e fuori moda: così, a dirvi il vero, Onegin ne sapeva quanto basta a decifrare un’epigrafe, a disquisire su Giovenale, apporre in fine di lettera vale, e ricordava, ma non senza errore, due versi dell’Eneide. Non aveva voglia di rovistare nella polvere cronologica della storiografia terrestre; tratteneva in vece il ricordo degli aneddoti dei tempi passati, da Romolo fino ai giorni nostri.

Nowadays Latin is out of fashion: Thus, to tell the truth, Onegin knew enough To make out an epigraph, Chat about Juvenal, Put vale at the end of letters, And remembered, but not without mistakes, Two lines from the Aeneid. He had no wish to rummage in the chronological dust Of terrestrial historiography; He kept instead the memory Of anecdotes of bygone times, From Romulus to our days.

Let us notice two rough moments: “terrestrial” historiography (naturally, at the time UFOs were unknown) and “the” anecdotes, as well as the deafening irruption of rhyme (“Giovenale”/”vale”). On the other hand, with the

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disappearance of metre and rhyme, which confer upon the rather rough syntactic organisation of the original all the required coherence, the Italian text looks literally like a pile of juxtaposed sentences. Altro che Pushkin! Giudici: Non è più di moda il latino: E dunque, per la precisione, Lui ne sapeva quel tantino Per decifrare un’inscrizione, Per dir la sua su Giovenale, Per apporre a una lettera vale E dell’Eneide un due o tre versi, Pur con errore, ritenersi. Nessuna voglia lo pungeva Di rovistare in profondo La polverosa storia del mondo; Eppure a memoria sapeva Certi aneddoti ormai perenti Da Romolo ai nostri tempi.

Latin is no longer in fashion: and so, to be precise, he knew enough to make out an inscription, to pass an opinion on Juvenal, to add vale to a letter and of the Aeneid two or three lines, though with mistakes, to remember. He had no urge to rummage deeply in the dusty history of the world; yet, he knew by heart certain now forgotten anecdotes from Romulus to our times.

There is not much to be said indulgently about this try: the price of imitating the strophe is high and the imitation thus bought not worth it - a bad deal any which way one looks at it. One thing has to be admitted, though: there are no translation mistakes, and we finally get it right with “per la precisione” preceding Onegin’s qualifications as a kitchen Latinist. The rough spots are merely formal... Except that in literature and, especially, poetry, they are the only intolerable ones, because those are the ones wreaking havoc with literature and poetry. Let us move back to English: Prall Radin/Patrick

Deutsch:

Latin is just now not in vogue, But if the truth I must relate, Onéguine knew enough, the rogue A mild quotation to translate, A little Juvenal to spout, With “vale” finish off a note; Two verses he could recollect Of the Aeneid, but incorrect. In history he took no pleasure, The dusty chronicles of earth For him were but of little worth, Yet still of anecdotes a treasure Within his memory there lay, From Romulus unto our day.

SINCE LATIN now is out of fashion, Our friend retained without a doubt Of Latin just sufficient ration An epigraph to figure out, Complete a letter, writing “vale” Discuss the works of Juvenale. A verse or two of Virgil note Not quite the words the poet wrote; He had no wish to scan the pages Or probe the pre-historic dust For secrets of our cosmic crust, But anecdotes of bygone ages, From present days to Romulus, He memorised for future use.

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Elton/Briggs:

Falen:

‘Tis out of fashion now, is Latin; And yet, in truth, it was no doubt A language he was rather pat in. A motto he could puzzle out, Could prate of Juvenal; none better Could with a Vale end a letter; Yes, could two lines of Virgil say With several blunders on the way. Onegin had no sort of longing To rummage in the dust of dates Or chronicles of ancient states; But to his memory came thronging Full many a hoary anecdote From Romulus till now, to quote.

The Latin vogue today is waning, And yet I’ll say on his behalf, He had sufficient Latin training To gloss a common epigraph, Cite Juvenal in conversation, Put vale in a salutation; And he recalled, at least in part, A line or two of Virgil’s art. He lacked, it’s true, all predilection For rooting in the ancient dust Of history’s annals full of must, But knew by heart a fine collection Of anecdotes of ages past: From Romulus to Tuesday last.

Arndt:

Johnston:

The Latin vogue has now receded, And I must own that, not to brag, He had what knowledge may be needed To puzzle out a Latin tag, Flaunt Juvenal in a discussion, Add “Vale” to a note in Russian; Of the Aeneid, too, he knew, With some mistakes, a line or two. To burrow in the dusty pages Of Clio’s chronologic waste Was hardly to our hero’s taste; But anecdotes of bygone ages, From Romulus to days just past. To these his memory clung fast.

Now Latin’s gone quite out of favour; yet, truthfully and not in chaff, Onegin knew enough to savour the meaning of an epigraph, make Juvenal his text, or better add vale when he signed a letter; stumblingly call to mind he did two verses of the Aeneid. He lacked the slightest predilection for ranking up historic dust or stirring annalistic must; but groomed an anecdote-collection that stretched from Romulus in his prime across the years to our time.

All six versions are quite good; all score fine points, such as Falen’s “And yet I’ll say on his behalf,” which is the most brilliant introduction to Onegin’s meagre Latin. It is here that Johnston stumbles with his as inflated as redundant “Yet, truthfully and not in chaff.” Arndt hits the nail magnificently on its head better than Pushkin himself!- with his “Flaunt Juvenal in a discussion” and repeats his feat with “To burrow in the dusty pages / Of Clio’s chronologic waste /Was hardly to our hero’s taste.” Elton/Briggs produce a most ingenious compound rhyme (“pat in”) where Pushkin has none... so what! It is but slightly marked, perfectly apt noetically and pragmatically, and I, for one, have no objection. The Sadermans’ translation, by the way, goes: Hoy el latín pasó de moda; pero él, a decir verdad, lo manejaba hasta el punto de saber descifrar un epígrafe, platicar sobre Juvenal y terminar una carta con

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la palabra ‘vale’, y recordaba -no sin algunas fallas, por cierto- un par de versos de la Eneida. Jamás se le dio por escarbar en el polvo cronológico de las viejas crónicas, pero conservaba en su memoria el anecdotario completo de los tiempos muertos, desde Rómulo hasta nuestros días. [Today Latin is out of fashion; but he, to say the truth, managed it to the point to be able to decipher an epigraph, chat on Juvenal and finish a letter with the word ‘vale,’ and he remembered -no without some mistakes, by the way- a couple of lines from the Aeneid. He never had an inclination to dig into the chronologic dust of old chronicles, but he kept in his memory all annals of anecdotes of dead times, from Romulus to our days.]

That bad! I shall spare you my comments. Blank Chilikov proffers thus: Hoy el latín pasó de moda; no obstante, Oneguin dominaba lo suficiente esta lengua para poder interpretar epígrafes, poner un vale en el final de una carta, hablar en torno a Juvenal y recitar (no sin tropiezos) de la Eneida un par de versos. Evgueny, poco aficionado a escudriñar en los anales, guardaba en cambio en su memoria anécdotas que se contaron desde los tiempos muy remotos de Rómulo hasta ahora.

Today Latin went out of fashion; Nevertheless, Oneguin mastered Sufficiently that language To be able to interpret Epigraphs, put a vale In the end of a letter, To talk around Juvenal And recite (not without difficulty) of the Aeneid a couple of lines. Evgueny, not all too bent On prying into the annals, Kept instead in his memory Anecdotes that were told From the very distant times Of Romulus up to now.

Yes, dear reader, that bad! Were it not for the (most awkward) inversion in the ninth line and the mostly imperceptible metric form, this reads like a UN document. Despite being a native speaker, Bravo also negotiates the strophe rather ungainly: El latín no está hoy de moda, Pero, a decir verdad, El sabía lo bastante de ese idioma Para descifrar los epígrafes, Hablar de Juvenal, finalizar Una carta con la palabra vale Y recordar, aunque no sin tropiezos, Un par de versos de La Eneida. No le interesaba hurgar En el polvo cronológico De la historia de la Tierra, Pero desde los tiempos de Rómulo

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Today Latin is not in fashion, But, to tell the truth, He knew enough of that language To make out the epigraphs, Speak about Juvenal, end A letter with the word vale And recall, although not without trouble, A couple of lines from The Aeneid. He had no interest in rummaging In the chronologic dust Of the history of the Earth, But since Romulus

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Hasta hoy retenía en su memoria Anécdotas sin fin.

To our day he held in his memory Anecdotes galore.

Yes, dear reader, that bad! And now for the really atrocious: Markoff: ... Y aunque el latín no esté muy en boga en nuestros tiempos, diremos, en honor de la verdad, que conocía también alguna que otra cosa de este idioma; lo indispensable para leer a juvenal, terminar cualquier carta con un “Vale” y recitar dos o tres versos de la “Eneida”, aunque no sin tropiezos. Le faltaban afán y paciencia para sumergirse en el polvo de la cronología histórica, pero retenía en su memoria todas las anécdotas conocidas desde los tiempos de Rómulo hasta nuestros días. [... And although Latin is not much in fashion in our times, we shall say, for the sake of truth, that he also knew something or other of this language; enough to read Juvenal, finish any letter with a “Vale” and recite two or three lines from the “Aeneid,” although not without trouble. He lacked eagerness and patience to immerse himself in the dust of historical chronology, but he retained in his memory all the known anecdotes since the times of Romulus to our days.]

Tchernova: ...Hoy día el latín no está de moda; pero, a decir verdad, él sabía lo bastante de este idioma para poder descifrar los epígrafes, hablar de Juvenal, poner un vale al final de una carta y recitar sin dificultad dos o tres versos de la Eneida. No tenía suficiente afán ni interés para rebuscar en el polvo cronológico la historia de la tierra; pero se sabía de memoria todas las anécdotas desde los tiempos de Rómulo hasta nuestros días. [...Today Latin is not in fashion, to tell the truth, he knew enough of this language to be able to make out the epigraphs, speak about Juvenal, put a vale at the end of a letter and recite without difficulty two or three lines from the Aeneid. He had not enough eagerness or interest to rummage in the chronologic dust of the history of the earth; but he knew by heart all the anecdotes from the times of Romulus to our days.]

Anonymous: ...Hoy día el latín no está en auge; pero él sabía lo suficiente del mismo para poder descifrar epígrafes, hablar de Juvenal y recitar sin vacilar dos o tres versos de la “Eneida”. No tenía suficiente empeño para rebuscar en la historia; pero recordaba todas las anécdotas, desde la época de Rómulo hasta nuestros días. [...Nowadays Latin is not in its heyday; but he knew enough of the same to be able to make out epigraphs, speak about Juvenal and recite without hesitating © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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two or three lines from the “Aeneid.” He had not enough will to rummage in the history; but he remembered all the anecdotes, from the times of Romulus to our days.]

And next for the unbelievably preposterous: Donna Teresa: ...Y a pesar de que hoy día el latín no sea de uso corriente diremos, para hacer justicia, que no desconocía por completo este idioma; sus conocimientos eran los suficientes como para poder leer a Juvenal, poner un “Vale” al final de cualquier carta, o recitar, aunque con tropiezos, algunos versos de la Eneida. Carecía de la paciencia y el interés necesarios para estudiar a fondo la cronología histórica, pero recordaba con gran precisión, gracias a su prodigiosa memoria, todas las anécdotas que habían tenido lugar desde la época de Rómulo hasta el momento presente. [...And despite the fact that nowadays Latin is not commonly used we shall say, to be fair, that that language was not completely unknown to him; his knowledge was enough to be able to read Juvenal, put a “Vale” at the end of any letter, or recite, although with difficulty, some lines from the Aeneid. He lacked the necessary patience and interest to study in depth the historical chronology, but he remembered with great precision, thanks to his prodigious memory, all the anecdotes that had taken place since the times of Romulus to the present moment.]

It is remarkable that in English there should be a plethora of modern translations of eminent calibre (plus Nabokov’s, which, if we accept its purpose, is a wonder of semantic fidelity), while there are but two so-so in French, and none in Italian or Spanish - or that only one of seven Spanish translations is by a native speaker. How is this possible? This painful subject deserves its own book. In any event, I can think of only two answers: either Romance languages are inherently inept or the fault lies, not so much with individual translators as with a glaring paucity of a pool of translators, on the one hand both able, and willing and, on the other, armed with an apt explicit or implicit theory. A cursory glance at the translational canon into Spanish, with its astonishing lack of metric translations points, I submit, to the true cause: Romance literatures are the innocent victims of an all too Catholic approach to “the original.” Let me try my usual unpretentious prose: Although Latin is no longer in fashion, he did know enough of it to make out epigraphs, mention Juvenal in a conversation, end a letter with vale, and quote, if not quite safely, a couple of lines from the Aeneid. He did not relish at all in burrowing into the ancient dust of our species chronology, but he did keep in his head quite a few anecdotes of bygone days, from Romulus to our present times.

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This is, I think, a natural verbalisation, as someone would say in functional English what Pushkin said with so much care in Russian. It is lightyears away from poetry and it barely scratches literary prose, but it has two important merits: it says what it must say, and it says it without awkwardness. This Anglo-Saxon Pushkin is no great poet, but he does not write dangerously either. A translation such as this one would fall perfectly under García Landa’s model, but would not function as literature: the novel’s plot is simply not enough. Onegin is not Hamlet, nor are the adventures in his petty life or the characters he encounters or the situations he faces comparable to those that make Brothers Karamazov, A Hundred Years of Solitude or Madame Bovary such peaks of world literature. If Oneguin were not in astonishingly beautiful verse (i.e. if it were nothing but a novel) it would have never made it to the very top of one of the most important literatures of the XIXth century: you are robbed of this, dear reader, and you have been robbed of anything worth keeping. Without letting go of Oneguin, let us analyse a very frequent problem, especially in literary translation, which is when the formal attributes of Fo are used to indicate the social status, geographical origin or other sociological or psychological features that a character reveals as he speaks. Onegin moves to his deceased uncle’s property and starts meeting the neighbouring gentry. At first, they receive him hospitably and with keen interest, but in view of his unacceptable behaviour they soon cease any dealings with him. This is how strophe 5, Chapter II reads: Snachála vsje k jemú eszháli; No tak kak s zádnjego kriltsá Obyknovjénno podaváli Jemú donskógo zherjebtsá Lish tólko vdol bolshói dorógi Zaslyshat ukh domáshnji drogi,Postúpkom oskorbjás takím, Vsje drúzhbu prjekratíli s nim. ‘Sosjéd nash njéuch; sumasbródit; On farmazón; on pjot odnó stakánom krásnoje vinó; On dámam k rúchkje nje podkhódit; Vsjo ‘da’ da ‘njet’; nje skázhet ‘da-s Il ‘net-s’. Takóv byl glas.

At first they all would call on him, but since to the back porch there habitually was brought a Don stallion for him the moment that along the highway their homely shandrydans were heard outraged by such behaviour, they all ceased to be friends with him. ‘Our neighbour is a boor; acts like a crackbrain; he’s a Freemason; he drinks only by the tumbler red wine; he does not kiss a lady’s hand; it is all ‘yes’ and ‘no’ - he’ll not say ‘yes’s,’ or ‘no’s.’’ This was the general voice.

What interests us is what the deuce do “yes’s” and “no’s” mean and why is it so important. Nabokov (whose translation I have tampered with above) translates “yes, sir” and “no, sir,” but, as we shall see, this can be misleading. In XIXth century Russian, among the well to do it was bad manners not to add that “s” (an apocopation of “sir” or “madam”), but what can we do so that the reader of the translation can perceive it? The ideal solution would be to find something analogous - something that a cultivated person would not have said in English,

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preferably during the XIXth century. The problem is to find it without releasing the bit of art. Let us see what our translators have done. This time around we begin with Spanish. Here are the Sadermans: Al principio venían visitantes de toda la comarca. Pero, no bien llegaba desde la carretera el traqueteo de sus carrindangas familiares, él se escurría por la puerta de servicio montado en su ya preparado potrillo. Ofendidos por tal conducta, todos rompieron relaciones con Eugenio. ‘Es un mal educado... Se hace el loco... Es un francmasón... No toma más que vino tinto, ¡y en qué vasos!... No besa las manos de las damas... Nunca dice ‘sí’, nunca dice ‘no’...’ Ese era el veredicto general. [At first they came to visit him from all around, but, as soon as from the highway was heard the squeaking of their familiar jalopies, he sneaked through the service door mounted on its already saddled colt. Offended by such behaviour, they all broke off relations with Eugene. ‘He is a boor... He acts like a madman... He is a Freemason... He drinks nothing but red wine, and in what glasses!... He does not kiss the ladies’ hands... He never says ‘yes,’ he never says ‘no’...’ That was the general verdict.]

He never says “yes” or “no”? If that were the case, would it not be a sign of politeness rather than boorishness? But aside from that, the noetic content is quite intact and plainly put forward. Bravo quoth thus: Al principio, todos le visitaban; Pero como en cuanto Por el camino real El ruido de sus carretas percibía, Solía, montado en su potro del Don, Por la puerta trasera escabullirse, Sintiéronse ofendidos Y rompieron la amistad con él. “Nuestro vecino es un ignorante, un chiflado, Un masón; tan sólo bebe vino tinto; A las damas no besa las manos; En lugar de sí, señora o no, señora, Sólo sí o no sabe decir.” Tal era la opinión general.

At first, all visited him; But since as soon As on the main road The noise of their wagons he perceived, He used to, riding his Don stallion, Through the back door to slide away, They felt offended And broke their friendship with him. “Our neighbour is an ignoramus, he’s crazy, A mason; he only drinks red wine; He does not kiss the ladies’ hand; Instead of yes, ma’am or no, ma’am, Only yes or no he says.” That was the general opinion

“Wagons!” “Crazy!” And, oh those unbearable inversions! Chílikov does not improve things one bit with: Primeramente los vecinos le visitaron, pero al poco se reveló que siempre cuando a su hacienda se acercaba el carricoche de un vecino,

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se le traía al traspatio Un alazán ya ensillado. Entonces todos se indignaron Y le negaron su amistad. “Es un inculto, un calavera, Un francmasón; ingiere el tinto En grandes vasos; nunca besa La mano a las damas; dice Un “sí”en vez de “sí, señora”.” Tal fue el juicio general.

they brought him to the rear courtyard An already saddled sorrel. Then they all became furious and denied him their friendship. “He is rude, a crackpot, a Freemason; he ingests red wine in big glasses; he never kisses the ladies’ hand; he says a ‘yes’ instead of ‘yes, ma’am.’” Such was the general assessment.

The Four Translators of the Apocalypse respectively inflict: Markoff: Al principio todos le visitaron, pero al darse cuenta de que le preparaban a Onieguin un brioso corcel del Don, que le aguardaba junto a la puerta trasera, tan pronto como sus coches se acercaban, indignáronse en masa los vecinos y rompieron con él sus relaciones amistosas. “Nuestro vecino es tonto e inculto; y probablemente masón; y que bebe enormes copas de vino tinto. No besa la mano a las señoras y contesta brevemente con un “sí” o con un “no”, sin añadir cosa alguna”. Tal era la opinión común. [At first all visited him, but upon realising that they prepared for Onegin a spirited steed from the Don, which awaited him next to the rear door, as soon as their carriages approached, all neighbours felt outraged en masse and broke their friendly relations with him. “Our neighbour is silly and uncouth; and probably a Mason; and he drinks large stemmed glasses of red wine. He does not kiss the ladies’ hands and replies tersely with a “yes” or with a “no,” without adding any other thing.” Such was the shared opinion.]

Tchernova: Al principio iban todos a visitarle; pero en cuanto vislumbraba sus coches caseros a lo lejos del camino real, mandaba que le ensillaran su caballo del Don y salía por la puerta trasera. Ofendidos por tal acto, todos rompieron su amistad con él. “Nuestro vecino es un ignorante, un chiflado, un masón, y bebe vaso tras vaso de vino tinto, no besa la mano a las señoras y habla a la manera moderna.” Tal era la opinión general. [At first they all came to visit him; but as soon as he spotted their domestic carriages in the distance of the main road, he had them saddle his Don horse and went out the back door. Outraged at such act, all broke their friendship with him. “Our neighbour is an ignoramus, a madcap, a Mason, and drinks glass after glass of red wine, does not kiss the ladies’ hands and speaks in the modern fashion.” Such was the general opinion.]

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Anonymous: Al principio iban todos a visitarle; pero en cuanto vislumbraba sus coches mandaba que le ensillaran su caballo y se iba por la puerta trasera. Ofendidos por sus fugas, rompieron su amistad. “Es un ignorante, un chiflado, un masón, y empina vaso tras vaso de vino, no besa la mano a las señoras y habla a la moderna.” Tal era la opinión general. [At first they all came to visit him; but as soon as he spotted their carriages he had them saddle his horse and left through the back door. Offended by his flights the broke their friendship. “He is an ignoramus, a loony, a Mason, and pushes down glass after glass of wine, does not kiss the ladies’ hands and speaks in the modern fashion.” Such was the general opinion.]

The sublime Donna Teresa: Al principio todos se portaron correctamente y le visitaron en su casa, pero tan pronto se dieron cuenta de que, cuando sus coches se acercaban, a Onieguin le preparaban un esbelto y veloz corcel del Don que le aguardaba en la puerta trasera del edificio, se indignaron todos los vecinos y se negaron a continuar sosteniendo con él relaciones amistosas. En general opinaban así: “Nuestro vecino es un hombre inculto y tonto, e incluso seguramente masón, puesto que ingiere enormes cantidades de vino tinto en copas de gran tamaño. Nunca besa la mano a las señoras, y cuando se le pregunta, se limita a contestar con un “sí” o con un “no”, sin añadir ninguna palabra más.” [At first they all behaved correctly and visited him at home, but as soon as they realised that, when their carriages approached, they prepared for Onegin a graceful and fast steed from the Don that awaited at the back door of the building, all the neighbours were outraged and they refused to go on maintaining with him friendly relations. In general this was their opinion: “Our neighbour is an uncouth and silly man, and even most likely a Mason, since he ingests huge amounts of red wine in stemmed glasses of a large size. He never kisses the ladies’ hands, and when asked, he limits himself to reply with a “yes” or with a “no,” without adding one more word.”]

Why? Why bother to translate at all? Alas, poor Pushkin! I knew him well, my reader! Now for the French versions: Minor: Au début tous venaient chez lui. Et puis, un jour, il remarquèrent Que, lorsque parvenait le bruit De leurs calèches sur ses terres, Il filait par la porte du fond, Et enfourchait son étalon. Ils furent vexés par cette conduite, 354

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Et ils cessèrent leur visites : ‘Que voilà un grossier quidam, Un farmaçon ! De plus, par verres, Au vin rouge il se désaltère, Ne baise pas la main des dames Et ne parle qu’en Oui et Non, Ni ouais, ni nais : un fanfaron !’

and the stopped their visits. ‘What a boorish person, a Freemason! To boot, by the glass, with red wine he quenches his thirst, He does not kiss the ladies’ hands and says only ‘yes’ and ‘no,’ not ‘yep’ or ‘nope’: a braggart!’

Backès: Il eut d’abord force visites ; Mais comme on avait pris le pli De lui tenir près de la porte De derrière un cheval sellé Dès qu’on entendait approcher Sur la grand-route une voiture, Les voisins, piqués de ce trait, Rompirent tout lien avec lui. ‘C’est un goujat, un lunatique, Un franc-maçon ; il ne veut boire Que du vin, et dans un grand verre ; Il ne fait pas le baisemain ; Il dit ‘oui’, tout sec, comme un rustre Tel fut le verdict général.

At first he had many visitors; but since he had acquired the habit to have near the rear door a saddled horse as soon as he heard a carriage approaching on the highway, the neighbours, peeved by this fact, broke off relations with him. ‘He is a boor, a lunatic, a Freemason; he refuses to drink anything but wine, and in a big glass; he does not kiss the ladies’ hands; he says ‘yes,’ curtly, like a peasant,’ Such was the general verdict.

Markowicz: D’abord, tous lui rendaient visite ; Mais notre Eugène, en général, Se pressait de prendre la fuite Par les communs, sur son cheval Dès qu’il voyait leurs équipages Arriver avec grand tapage. Vexés par ces agissements, Ils changèrent leurs sentiments : “Mais, notre voisin est infâme ! Il délire ! oh ! quel franc-maçon ! Le vin est sa seule boisson ! Et malpoli avec les dames ! Il connaît pas le beau parler ! Ignare !” Ce fut un tollé.

At first, all came to visit him, But our Eugene, as a rule, Wasted no time in escaping Through the commons, on his horse, As soon as he spotted their carriages Arriving with a great din. Irked by these actions, They changed their feelings: “Say, our neighbour is odious! He’s of his rocker! Oh! What a Freemason! Wine is his only drink! And impolite with the ladies! He cannot speak as a gentleman! Ignorant!” It was an uproar.

Legras: Au début, tous le visitèrent. Mais vu que l’on menait à lui, Sans faute, au perron derrière, Son pur-sang du Don, quand le bruit Sur la route, annonçait l’allure

At first, all visited him, But since they brought him, Invariably, to the back stairs, His pur sang from the Don, when the noise On the road, announced the pace

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De leurs familiales voitures, Tous, d’un tel procédé froissés, Avec lui commerce ont cessé : “Butor, ce voisin ! - Tête sotte ! Un franc-maçon ! - Sachez encor Qu’il boit du vin rouge, à pleins bords ! Ne baise, aux dames, la menotte Et, tout sec, vous dit “oui” ou “non”. C’était la commune opinion.

Of their family carriages, All, hurt by such procedure, Ceased all commerce with him: “A boor, this neighbour! - silly head! A Freemason! Know besides That he drinks red wine, to the brim! He doesn’t kiss the ladies’ tiny hands And, curtly, he says to you “yes” or “no.” That was the general opinion.

Colin: D’abord on lui rendit visite. Mais comme, à l’arrière-perron, Il faisait amener de suite Quelque pour sang issu du Don, Dès que tintait sur le chemin La carriole d’un voisin, D’un tel procédé s’offusquant, Tous ils rompirent sur le champ : “C’est un malappris ! Il déraille ! Que du vin rouge pour boisson ! Dans un grand verre ! Un frimasson ! Et du baisemain il se raille ! Il dit : oui, non, sans plus, et non Oui, m’sieur ! Non, m’sieur !” Tel fut le ton.

At first they came to visit him But as, to the back stairs He had brought at once Some pur sang from the Don, As soon as a neighbour’s horses cart jingled on the road, Irked at such behaviour, They all broke off at once: “He is a boor! He’s put of his mind! But red wine for a drink! In a big glass! A Frymason! And doesn’t bother to kiss hands! He says: yes, no, like that, and not Yessir! No, sir! That was the tone.

Bayat: D’abord tous vinrent le visiter, mais -comme à la porte de service on avait pris l’habitude de lui amener un poulain du Don chaque fois que sur la grand-route on percevait le bruit de leur voitures- offensés d’une pareille conduite, tous rompirent avec lui. “Notre voisin est un malappris, il extravague, c’est un franc-maçon, il boit le vin rouge par verres, ne baise pas la main des dames, et toujours “oui” et toujours “non”, sans mettre une nuance de politesse.” Voila ce que tous répétaient en choeur. [At first all came to visit him, but -as to the service door they had taken the habit of bringing him a Don foal each time that on the main road the noise of their carriages was heard- offended by such a behaviour, they all broke off with him. “Our neighbour is a boor, he’s out of his mind, he’s a Freemason, he drinks red wine by the glass, he doesn’t kiss the ladies’ hands, and always “yes” and “no,” without a hint of politeness.” Such was what they all clamoured as one.]

Again, we see Onegin invariably as a vulgar sot, which he definitely is not! Obviously, this “da’s”/“njet’s” is a problem for all translators. The best solutions are Bayat’s and Backès’s, who intimate why the neighbours find Onegin’s way of speaking rude. “Yes, sir” and “no, sir” are completely off the 356

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mark: Onegin speaks on equal terms with the landed gentry. “Ouais”/“nais,” as suggested by Minor, does not convey the transgression of etiquette, or, rather, overshoots it by a hundred miles: Onegin is not vulgar. On the contrary, he is an aristocrat from St. Petersburg, who, with all the limitations consigned in the first strophes, has benefited from the best education a young gentleman could receive. He simply refuses to be cuddly with those provincial and pretentious interlocutors. Several translators try and make amends in their notes. Minor says “Yes” and “no,” contrary to etiquette, which demanded ambiguous replies (i.e. exactly the opposite to what the Sadermans assert). What nonsense! The rest keep silent, at least in the editions that I have consulted. Legras and Markowicz, as usual, produce the best versions all round. The latter, by the way, finds the best solution to the problematic “yes”/“no” problem: he simply cuts the explicature short and lets the reader’s imagination take over. The Italians give us: Bazzarelli: In principio tutti si recavano da lui; ma poiché egli fuggiva dal pianerottolo posteriore su uno stallone del Don, non appena sentiva le loro carrozze private sulla grande strada, tutti si offesero per un tale modo di fare: e ruppero i rapporti di amicizia. “Il nostro vicino è un ignorante, uno stravagante pazzo; è un framassone; beve soltanto vino rosso del bicchiere; non bacia la mano delle dame: dice solo ‘si’ e ‘no’, e non: ‘sissignore’, ‘nossignore’”. Tale era la voce corrente. [At first they all came to visit him; but as he fled through the back door on a Don stallion, as soon as he heard their private carriages on the highway, they all took offence at such way of acting and broke off their friendly relationship. ‘Our neighbour is an ignoramus, a mad extravagant; he is a Freemason; he drinks only red wine in glasses; he does not kiss the ladies’ hands: he says ‘yes’ and ‘no,’ and not ‘yes, sir,’ and ‘no, sir.’ That was the general voice.]

Lo Gatto: Da principio tutti venivano a trovarlo; ma siccome dalla scala di servizio di solito egli si faceva portare un puledro del Don, non appena soltanto lungo la strada maestra si sentivano le loro carrozze campagnole, - offesi da un tal procedere, troncarono tutti l’amicizia con lui. ‘Il nostro vicino è un ignorante, uno stravagante, è un frammasone; egli beve soltanto bicchieri di vino rosso: alle signori non bacia la mano; risponde solo sì e no senza un complimento’. Questa era la voce generale. [At first they all came to visit him; but since at the service stairs he had a Don stallion brought, as soon as along the road their rustic carriages were heard, offended by such behaviour, they broke off their friendship with him. ‘Our neighbour is an ignoramus, an extravagant, he is a Freemason; he drinks only

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glasses of red wine; he does not kiss the ladies’ hands; he replies only yes and no without a compliment.’ That was the general voice.]

Pera: All’inizio andavano tutti da lui; ma poiché di norma all’altro ingresso, quello di servizio, gli conducevano per le redini uno stallone del Don non appena lungo la strada maestra si udiva un cigolio di rustiche ruote, urtati da tale offensiva condotta ruppero tutti l’amicizia con lui. ‘Il nostro vicino è uno zoticone; è un bislacco; è un framassone; beve il vino rosso a calici interi; non fa il bacciamano alle signore; risponde solo sì e no; non sisignore o nossignore. Questa era la voce comune.

At first all came to visit him; But since usually to the other door, The service one, they brought Him by the reins a Don stallion As soon as along the highway The squeaking of rustic wheels was heard, Upset at such an offensive behaviour They broke off all friendship with him. ‘Our neighbour is a boor; He is an extravagant; he is a Freemason; he drinks red wine in glasses filled to the brim; He does not kiss the ladies’ hands; He replies only yes and no; not yes sir Or no sir. This was the common voice.

Giudici: L’andavano tutti a trovare Da principio; ma poi però Che lui dalle retroscale Sul suo stallone del Don Tagliava alla svelta la corda Sentendo carrozze alla porta, Offeso per l’impertinenza Cessò ognuno la sua frequenza. ‘Che screanzato e matto vicino! È un frammassone! A più non posso Scola quarti di vino rosso! E alle dame non fa l’ inchino! Solo ‘si’ o ‘no’, mai ‘sissignore’ Risponde’. Era tutto un rumore.

All came to visit him At first, but later, since By the bridle stairs On his Don steed He took off at full gallop Upon hearing their carriages at the door, Offended at such impertinence Each of them ceased to frequent him. What an insolent and crazy neighbour! He is a Freemason! He drinks tumbler upon quarter-litre tumbler of red wine! And he does not bow to the ladies! Just ‘yes’ and ‘no,’ never ‘yes sir’ He replies. It was a big noise.

Where does Bazzarelli get that nonsense of “private” carriages? What need is there to explicate the “friendship” relations? Where does Lo Gatto find those “stairs”? What need to explicate that it is the “main” road? Pia Pera does not honour her name: for Heaven’s sake; “the other door, the service one...” - as if there were any need, as if it were right! “By the bridle”? How else if not by the bridle? Worst of all, we are now facing an Onegin about to give way to delirium tremens, drinking quarter-litre tumbler upon quarter-litre tumbler of red wine (the things bad translators write when they have to make two lines rhyme, or even without an excuse!). Again we have “yes sir” and “no sir” (except for Lo Gatto, but what kind of relationship is established by that colon between the glasses of red wine and Onegin’s refusal to kiss the ladies’ hands?). The Italian 358

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versions crumble under the weight of their un-idiomaticity. I might understand it (if never accept it as a lover of good literature as are, I assume, most of those ready to invest money, time and effort in this kind of texts) if the translators invoked as extenuating circumstances the formal constraints that they have imposed upon themselves, but where are these restrictions? If one is to say it in prose (some concession!), why not then do so in good prose, or at least in simple prose, or, at worst, not in excruciating prose? If we are going to be left but with the sheer noetic content of an LP, bereft of the least aesthetic intention, let it not be so egregiously bad! Poor Pushkin! Poor those readers who can only glimpse at this masterwork through the fly-soiled glasses of these Romance translations! What a difference with the seven (!) metric versions into English (plus the Nabokovian semantic feast), regardless of all the criticisms that can be levelled against them! Someone may argue that Romance languages are less flexible, or that in any event they do not allow for a plausible imitation of the iambic tetrameter, or that they lack English’s comfortable monosyllabic fund. Nonsense! And if you don’t want to take my word for it, take that of implacable Etkind: “(L)a dépréciation ou l’exaltation de telle ou telle langue, la précellence décernée à tel ou tel principe esthétique qui serait propre à une langue, tout cela représente une démarche non linguistique. Une critique de cette sorte vise en fait non pas la langue, mais la littérature écrite en cette langue” (op. cit.: 61). [The underrating or exaltation of such or such language, as the prevalence given such or such specific aesthetic principle that is allegedly exclusive of a certain language are not linguistic judgements. This kind of criticism aims not at a language but at literature written in that language.]

Better a pedestrian translation than none at all, will say a few. Once again, I prefer to give Etkind the floor: “Ah, mais non ! Ce n’est pas “mieux que rien”. Le mot à mot... vous laisse perplexe : vous ne comprenez pas la raison d’être [du] texte” (op. cit.:35). [Oh, but no! It is not ‘better than nothing.’ Literal translation confounds us: we cannot understand the raison d’être of such a text.]

Here is the crux of the matter: These misbegotten translations make it impossible to understand the raison d’être of a text (i.e. of a literary utterance). A translation that prevents from seeing such an elementary thing cannot but frustrate its reader’s expectations. If, nevertheless, such translations do exist, and if they are published, sold and read, it is because their reader knows that behind this second speech act there is a magnificent and transcendental one, and is ready to give the author the full benefit of the doubt - but what reader would accept such an enormity as original literature? How famous would Pushkin be if © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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he had written like that in Italian, or French, or Spanish (or, in the case of English, like his translator Nabokov)? What are his chances of making a place for himself in those literatures, as Lorca, Mallarmé or Leopardi have in Russian literature thanks to the generous genius of genial translators? Indeed, when judging a literary work each and every aesthetic criterion is applied that applies to any literary act of speech. García Landa’s model, makes it possible to identify, from the standpoint of an informed critic, any mistakes or successes in LPI comprehension and reverbalisation. Again, here ends the translatological analysis proper and begins the literary one. My model of literary mediation, I submit, allows us to take that crucial step forward towards the integration of the twain. At last the dilemma and mystery of literary translation is clear: give unto translation what belongs to translation, unto literature what belongs to literature - and unto mediation what belongs to both. The act of translational and literary speech (almost always induced by a literary act of speech) is judged by two tribunals of relatively autonomous jurisdictions - the act of literary mediation is judged by a panel composed of both. So, after this indigestion, let us find some relief in those biting the English bit of art: Johnston:

Falen:

At first they called; but on perceiving invariably, as time went on, that from the back door he’d be leaving on a fast stallion from the Don, once on the highway he’d detected the noise their rustic wheels projected they took offence at this, and broke relations off, and never spoke. ‘‘The man’s a boor: his brain is missing, he’s a Freemason too: for him red wine in tumblers to the brim but ladies’ hands are not for kissing: it’s ‘yes’ or ‘no’, but never ‘sir.’’ The vote was passed without demur’.

At first his neighbours’ calls were steady; But when they learned that in the rear Onegin kept his stallion ready So he could quickly disappear The moment one of them was sighted Or heard approaching uninvited, They took offence and, one and all, They dropped him cold and ceased to call. ‘The man’s a boor, he’s off his rocker.’ ‘Must be a Mason; drinks, they say... Red wine, by tumbler, night and day!’ ‘Won’t kiss a lady’s hand, the mocker.’ ‘Won’t call me ‘sir’ the way he should.’ The general verdict was not good.

Elton/Briggs

Arndt:

At first they all drove in to greet him; But, since they mostly found that there His Don-bred colt was brought to meet him Round at the hinder entrance-stair, So he could slip off down a byway, Hearing their rough carts on the highway, -Such doings merely could offend; They ceased to treat him as a friend. ‘Our neighbour is a boor, and crazy;

At first his neighbours started calling; But when he kept by the back stoop, Their visits artfully forestalling, A Cossack cob (to fly the coop When rumbles of a homely coach First warned him of a guest’s approach), Such conduct struck them as ill bred, And all the County cut him dead. “Our neighbour is uncouth; he’s crazy;

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Freemason, too! Red wine, we think, In glasses, is his only drink. To kiss a lady’s hand, too lazy! He says plain ‘yes’, plain ‘no’- withal Without the ‘sir.’ So cried they all.

A Freemason; he only drinks Red wine in tumblers; never thinks To kiss a lady’s hand - too lazy; It’s ‘yes’ and ‘no,’ no ‘ma’am,’ no ‘sir.’ In this opinion all concur.

Prall Radin/Patrick:

Deutsch:

All visited him at first, of course ; But since to the backdoor they led Most usually a Cossack horse Upon the Don’s broad pastures bred If they but heard domestic loads Come rumbling up the neighbouring roads, Most by this circumstance offended All overtures of friendship ended. “Oh ! what a fool our neighbour is ! He’s a Freemason, so we think, Alone he doth his claret drink, A lady’s hand doth never kiss. ‘Tis yes ! No ! never madam ! Sir !” This was his social character.

At first, indeed, they came to visit, But presently, when they had found, He usually had his stallion Led out and saddled and brought round The back porch, when he would hear Their family coaches drawing near Affronted by such insolence, They one and all took deep offence. “Our neighbour’s just a firebrand, A Freemason, a boor. They say He sits and drinks red wine all day. He will not kiss a lady’s hand. He won’t say ‘Sir,’ just ‘Yes’ and ‘No!” Their view of him was very low.

As we see, they all go for “sir,” although Falen manages it more naturally (instead, his portrait of Onegin as an alcoholic is totally out of place). But, by Jove, what a difference with all the Romance concoctions except, up to a point, Legras’s and Markowicz’s! But let us move to noetic and referential content proper. Why do the Sadermans clarify that visitors came from “all the area”? It is not a completely gratuitous addition: the verb “sjezdit” is composed of “jezdit” (to travel) and the prefix “s-,” which in this case denotes convergence (the Russian noun for “congress,” for example, is “sjezd”). Russian allows the speaker to combine almost any verb denoting movement with any of fourteen prefixes denoting direction, degree of approach or distancing, etc. The possibility of adding extreme semantic precision by means of a sheer phoneme that more often than not does not even increase the number of syllables in a line is so much served on a platter that all native speakers take advantage of it. Pushkin, of course, does as well, and with consummate mastery, but what is the price to be paid by someone verbalising in Spanish? The one paid by the Sadermans. And what are the effects so dearly bought? Counterproductive: a heap of dreary art and no relevant matter, because there is simply no need laboriously to explicate that they came each from their own property, since, being landed gentry in the largest country on Earth, surely they were scattered all over a large area. The prefix “s-” simply accelerates the activation of this implicature with minimal processing effort, whence its relevance, but that is not the case with its explicitation in Spanish, which requires more processing effort than it produces © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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effects. The other translators seem to have understood it and have no qualms in waiving the seme [convergence]. And what are those “familiar jalopies” in the Spanish version? A most unfortunate verbalisation. It is but a detail, of many that Pushkin slips through as if unwittingly, but that add a masterly touch to description: Onegin’s neighbours, provincial land owners, obtuse, anything but bright and presumably not all that well off, come to visit him in carriages that had never been much to admire and are now old and creaky, which helps identify the noise they make. Johnston conveys the LPI economically and naturally, even more so than Pushkin himself: “rustic wheels.” The implicature is so immediately accessible that there is no need to add a single syllable. In Falen’s version, fillers are so obvious that they become funny: Again, the impression (that a self-respecting poet must never create and that Pushkin, by the way, never does) is that he bends backwards to complete the line and rhyme at any cost. Several translators explicate that Onegin mounts a Don stallion. In the English versions, the detail, although trivial, does not bother (it provides, after all, a precious additional syllable - and English translators -the lucky bastards!- tend to need lots of them). For the Russian reader it is, indeed, a telling detail, but what does it say to you, dear reader, that is relevant? Nothing, unless you know something relevant about it other than it is a good horse (what else would a young aristocrat who has inherited a country estate mount?), which requires a hermeneutic package that you probably lack. What do you lose that you had before? In view of the foreign reader’s insufficient hermeneutic package, the detail lacks purpose. If it can be introduced without impairing global perception, there is no reason not to, but to wedge it in with a semantic hammer is worse than useless - it is bothersome. The same applies to the Sadermans’ reminding us that Onegin, as opposed to redskins, rides on a saddle. The implicature in the original is clear: As soon as the rickety sound of one of those carriages was heard, the grooms rushed to saddle the horse and brought it “already ready” to the rear door - and not, by the way, the “service” door, which connotes a XXth century urban dwelling. Minor is the only one to explain “farmason,” yet another detail illustrating local society’s narrowness and ignorance (even though she adds -as unconvincingly, I think, as Nabokov- that, to his conservative neighbour’s increased indignation, Onegin drinks “foreign” wine). The others unnecessarily omit the irony. The wine in glasses has everybody trip but Johnston and, more notably, Backès, who is the only one to hit the nail on its head: What irritates in Onegin is not that he drinks too much, but that he drinks red wine (i.e. not champagne, that was obviously considered to be more refined) and in a regular glass (as opposed to a stemmed glass - a semantic distinction that cannot be made naturally in English but that is implied in Russian by the absent “rjúmka”“stemmed glass”). In the original, Eugene’s wilful indifference towards and distancing from his neighbours and their vacuousness are transparent. Pushkin’s 362

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mastery shows at several levels. The narrative is so natural that it seems that metre and rhyme just happen by chance. Details are chosen and sprinkled about as if with careless wit. It is the mark of great art - as if form, rather than constraining, liberated to the fullest the artist’s talent. As we can appreciate, this strophe is a microcosm of translation linguistic, metalinguistic and referential difficulties. I think this corroborates my initial general conclusion: all that matters in the end is the reader’s speech perception of meaning meant and the effects that it produces upon him. We have seen how the urge to include come what may certain semantic, referential or formal details can distort perception from the standpoint of its global noetic and pragmatic relevance as well as from that of form. What counts is a balance, a give and take between those modulations, compensations and shifts that are necessary or advisable in order to achieve relevant identity - which in the case of literary translation is synonymous with optimum identity between LPIo and LPCi in view of the specific possibilities and limitations of the target language and of the potential reader’s hermeneutic package. Since I dare not attempt a verbalisation that does minimum justice to the relevant formal demands, let me content you with my usual translation and show you the same noetic content in innocuous prose: At first they all came to visit him, but since as soon as one of their rickety carriages could be heard approaching along the road he had his stallion brought to the back door, they severed their friendship with him. ‘Our neighbour is a boor, he’s out of his mind! He’s a Frymason!’ ‘He will drink nothing but red wine - and in regular glasses! He won’t kiss the ladies’ hands! He speaks most disrespectfully!’ Such was the general verdict.

That is what the whole fuss about “da’s”/“njet’s” is really about: Onegin speaks with no respect for elementary etiquette. Since only in Russian not to add that “-s” is a breach of etiquette, what all translators should have done, I submit, is either find a pragmatically and situationally analogous breach (and no one manages to) or simply generalise. This example alone, I think, shows the actual practical value of the theory I am peddling: Once the felicity conditions of interlingual mediation are clear, the translator is freed to apply his heuristic talent without beating loudly around the bush. Let us move on. A case presenting great difficulty when translating into or from English is its lack of pragmatic distinction in the second person pronouns (“you” vs. “tú”/“usted”/“vosotros”/“ustedes,” “toi”/“vous,” “ty”/“vy,” etc.). There is a key moment where Tatiana, in love with Onegin, writes him a letter in which she suddenly starts addressing him with the familiar “ty” - in order later to revert to the more formal “vy.” She says: Drugói!... Njet, nikomú na cvjétje Nje otdalá by cjérdtsa ja!

Another!... No, to no one else in the world Would I give my heart!

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To v vyshnjem suxhdjenó sovjétje... To vólja njéba: ja tvojá...

Thus has a supreme Judge decided... That is Heaven’s will: I’m thine...

How do the English translators, whose Tatianas have been addressing Eugene as “you,” manage? Nabokov: Another!... No, to nobody on earth would I have given my heart away! That has been destined in a higher council, that is the will of heaven: I am thine...

Falen:

Johnston:

Another! No! In all creation There’s no one else whom I’d adore; The heavens chose my destination And made me thine for evermore!

‘Another!... No, another never in all the world could take my heart! Decreed in highest court for ever... heaven’s will - for you I’m set apart...’

Elton/Briggs:

Prall Radin/Patrick

‘Another!’... I would ne’er have given To living man, this heart of mine! This was the will of highest heaven, This was appointed: - I am thine!

But no! There is no other man To whom I could have given my love, And I am yours by Heaven’s plan Determined in the court above.

I also have a free version by Ruth Padel: But that’s all done with. This is fate. God. Sorted. I couldn’t give my heart To anyone else. Here I am - yours, to the last breath. My life till now has been a theorem, to demonstrate How right it is to be yours. This love is love to death.

Clarke’s prose reads: No there is noöne else in the world I could have surrendered my heart to. It is decreed by the highest authority, it is the call of Heaven: I am yours, Eugene.

A nifty trick indeed, having Tatiana call Onegin by his first name without patronymic! Possibly the best solution in English. Tatiana allows herself to be carried away by her passion up to the end of the letter, where, recovering her composure, she ends by writing: Koncháju! Stráshno pjerjechést... Stydóm i strákhom zamiráju... 364

I finish! I’m afraid or rereading... I’m dying of shame and fear...

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No mnje porúkoi vasha chest, I smjélo jei sjebjá vvjerjáju...

But I place my confidence in your friendship And trust myself daringly to it...

Whilst Johnston and Prall Radin/Patrick leave the passage unmarked, Nabokov, Elton/Briggs and Falen switch to “thou,” which Tatiana, a provincial girl of great sensitivity but scant reading and sophistication, would certainly never have proffered. Johnston, aware that the semantic remedy is worse than the perceptual malady, chooses naturalness, which reflects the character’s pure innocence, the distinctive trait of her personality, since, in Russian, Tatiana addresses Onegin naturally in both pragmatic “modes” (and from the standpoint of the way the character is perceived, any betrayal of that innocence is a betrayal of the character and, therefore, of Pushkin). And it does not end there: Except for Elton/Briggs, when Onegin prays that his uncle die once and for all, he does not address him as “thou;” and not even Elton/Briggs’s addresses his closest friend, Lenski, as “thou,” or later Tatiana’s husband, and old friend of his. The only character in the whole book to use the archaic English pronoun is Tatiana, perhaps the only one who would probably not know how to! It is true that the moment is crucial, and that the linguistic marker stresses it: Tatiana, who has already let herself be carried away by daring to write to Onegin, literally gives herself to him. Had Onegin shown at the window at that very instant, she would have most certainly invited him up into her room; but a second later, she has already collected herself enough to revert to the formal way of address. This is precisely the point that makes the archaism so jarring: at her most passionate, her heart about to explode, her whole young body arisen for the very first time the one moment that she actually loses whatever control she still had, this English Tatiana starts choosing her words like they were candy! This would be bad enough if she could, but she cannot: “she did not know Russian well and she found it hard to express herself in her mother tongue!” (exclamation mark by Mr. Aleksandr Pushkin himself!). Let us go back to the movie. Here is Liv Tyler’s letter to Ralph Fiennes: “Dearest Evgeni, I write to you; it’s all I can do. And now I know it’s in your heart to punish my presuming heart. Yet if you have one drop of pity, you’ll not abandon me to my unhappy fate. I am in love with you and I must tell you this or my heart, my heart, which belongs to you, will surely break. I would never have revealed my shame to you if just once a week I might see you, exchange a word or two, and then think day and night of one thing alone till our next meeting. But you’re unsociable. They say that the country bores you. Is it true? Does the country bore you? Sometimes I wonder that you ever visited us. Why? I’d never known you or know this agony fever. I know that all my life’s been leading me to this union with you. I recognised you at first sight and knew with certainty. I said to myself ‘It’s him. he’s come!’ Help me! Resolve my doubts! Perhaps all this is nonsense, emptiness, a delusion, and... and quite another fate awaits me. Imagine it: I’m here alone; half out of my mind. I dread to read this © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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over, my secret longing I know that I can trust your honour, though I feel faint from shame and fear.”

Strictly speaking, as we can see, the problem is not semantic or even linguistic: it is an unjustified mismatch between what is actually going on and the way we are told the characters behave; it is a mismatch between what we know or expect and what we are given to understand and the effects that such understanding has upon us - because if Pushkin lets us down here, at the crucial moment of the plot, he cannot be that great a master. Yet, the differences in use enter also into play: “ty”/“vy” and “thou”/“you” differ in value. Even within the same language -or, rather, the statistical fiction that counts as such- values change from one social group to another, as is the case of “tú”/“Ud” in different geographical or social parts of the Spanish-speaking world. In the specific case of Tatiana’s “thou,” the problem is compounded by the fact that nowadays, as Assis Rosa (2000:40) points out, the use of “thou” is circumscribed to prayer and naive poetry, to non-standard dialects, and to Quakers. The problem becomes most evident in Pushkin’s little gem Ty i vy (the literal rendition is by Arndt): Ty i Vy

Thou and You The empty you by the warm thou She by a slip of the tongue replaced And all happy daydreams Stirred up in the soul in love. Before her pensively I stand, To take [my] eyes off her [I have] not the strength; And [I] tell her: how nice of you! And think: how I love thee!

Pustóje vy sjerdjéchnym ty Ona, obmolviasj, zmjeníla I vsje schastlívyje mjechtý V dushé vljubljónnoj vozbudila. Prjed njej zadúmchivo stojú, Svjestí ochéj s njejó njet cíly; I govorjú jej: kak vy míly! I mýslju: kak tjebjá ljubliú!

Arndt’s mediation is hyperactive: Thou and You The pale “you are” by warm “thou art” Through careless slip of tongue replacing, She sent within the love-struck heart All sorts of happy fancies racing. I stand before her all beguiled; I stare at her, and the old Adam Blurts out: You are all kindness, Madam! And thinks: God, how I love thee, child!

As we can see, the translator has mediated quite recklessly: “You” is now openly associated with maturity and “thou” with early youth - with an unexpected cameo appearance by Adam himself. 366

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Carol Ann Duffy’s version is even more arbitrary: Not only does she associate “you” with speech and “thou” with song, but she departs so widely from the original that it becomes unrecognisable. Thou and you By a slip of her sweet tongue hard you was not spoken, but soft thou sung and my heart, used, broken, was whole again, young. I heard my own stiff voice thank her politely: how nice of you. Why make that choice when I thought how I love thee?

To my ears, it simply doesn’t work: I am an inveterate romantic, I come from a culture where the V-forms do not come easily to a lover’s lips, I love my wife dearly, I have loved other women before, and I have also lied a few times, but never, not once, have I said in English to any woman “I love thee.” If translators of Oneguin had the choice to let go of the systemic difference and hedge their losses, translators of this little poem are in a no-win situation: damn if they do and damn if they don’t! It is not their fault, of course; there is simply no way the situation can be re-framed idiomatically in English: an English speaker may be at a loss to tell a woman that she has beautiful breasts, but not about what pronoun to use when addressing her. What are the alternatives: You and you? Keep the Russian pronouns? Not to translate at all? There is no answer - because there is simply no way that relevant identity can be achieved in English. No, the poem is not “untranslatable,” witness the efforts above. Yes, it cannot be translated relevantly - or, at least, relevantly enough. This is where my conceptual distinction between perceptual identity and relevant identity gallops in tooting its providential bugle, like the US Cavalry in old Western films, to save the theoretical day - at least that is what I’d love to believe. So English is out. What about Romance languages? It ought to be a piece of cake, but it isn’t quite: Toi et vous Le triste vous en tu joyeux D’un lapsus elle l’a changé, Inspirant au coeur amoureux Tous les rêves les plus heureux. Je me tiens passif devant elle ; Je ne peux la quitter des yeux ; Je luis dit : que vous êtes belle ! Et je pense : comment je t’aime.

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The problem is now acoustic and, surprisingly, graphic: the all-butinaudible/invisible “t”! It simply cannot provide the symmetry of “ty”/“vy” or “thou”/“you”. Again, perception is the name of the game, and the game is won or lost perceptually. Lest you may be comforted in the thought that Spanish surely poses no problems, let me remind you that although both a XIXth century Spanish and a XXth century Latin American poet would have thought “cómo te amo,” and said “qué bella es,” Becker would have said “qué bella sois.” In Brazilian Portuguese, I suspect, “vôce” would be the idiomatic thing to think and say. More Pushkin We turn now to one of those epigrammatic gems that Pushkin seemed to pen off so nonchalantly. There is hardly any need to boost your hermeneutic package. This time around, let me dispense with the original, so that you can judge its translation as a literary text in the target language on its own right. Here is a possible semantic translation: Ex Unge Leonem (The lion is given away by his claws) Not long ago I happened to whistle some verses and sent them in for publication without my signature. A journalistic fool devoted a little piece to them and published it also without signing, the cad. Well, neither I nor the street market buffoon managed to hide our pranks: He knew me at once by my claws; I knew him precisely by his ears.

It is not this translator’s fault that the whole thing sounds rather pedestrian, and that there is no perceptible rhythm and definitely no sense of verse: Those above are the closest English equivalents to the original Russian lexemes, and here they are faithfully reproducing propositional content. This translator takes no responsibility for moving or amusing you, just for allowing you to understand the noetic plate. This translator, in other words, does not give a hoot about intentions or effects, his mission on earth is just “to translate the speaker’s words properly,” to “do and bye!” If I were a little ashamed, or if I were loath to abandon any hope of giving a Spanish reader at least an idea of the beauty and grace of Fo, I might perhaps say: Ex Unge Leonem Silbé no ha mucho sin querer en verso y mandélo sin firma publicar. Un bufón periodista, el muy perverso, le dedicó unas líneas... sin firmar. Pues bien, ni a mí ni al bufón de marras resultónos la broma baladí:

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I whistled not long ago unwittingly in verse And I had it published without signature. A journalistic fool, such a cad, Bashed them in a journal... without signing. Well, neither I nor the said buffoon Got away with our trifle prank:

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reconocióme al punto él por las garras y yo por las orejas le advertí.

He knew me right away by my claws, And I by his ears discovered him.

It is not a great poem - not because Spanish prevents it, but because my literary prowess will stretch no further. A talented poet might certainly improve my poem (but not, I submit, my “translation”) and transform it into something analogous to those first four Oneguin lines that Nabokov wrote just to despise them. What have I done? I have made my own not only the LPI’s noetic content, but also the ironic and aesthetic intention behind it. After all, Pushkin did not set out to tell Eugene’s story or to mock an asinine journalist and -would you believe it?- it so happened that his verbalisation came out exquisitely articulated phonomorphosyntactically, semantically and prosodically (as if a machine, translating Nabokov’s monster back into Russian bit by semantic bit had come up with a poem as good as the original): The intention is poetic from the very beginning. Renouncing the poetic intention is tantamount to modifying a fundamental fact, because if his attempt at writing Oneguin had been like the one by semantomaniac Nabokov, he would have committed suicide rather than so much as showing it to a friend! The poet aims at his readers’ aesthetic sensitivity - and, if very much aware of my limitations, so do I. I step both into his and your shoes, and I ask myself how Pushkin might have written his epigram if his language had been Spanish and his readers my own. It is not the only way of translating (what has been said can be re-said in countless ways), and it can lead to many aberrations (although hardly as aberrant as uncompromising semanticism), but it is definitely a possibility. If successful, such a translation manages what the original set out to do: move, amuse, make for pleasurable reading and, besides, what it achieved in its own milieu: to occupy a place of honour. That with respect to what the original poet, literature and language deserve. Also, the target literature is enriched, probably the target language itself, certainly the target readers. Even the translator (who, as a seller of his ability to work, will be always better off by translating at full speed a ream of death certificates than sublimely a single work of art) will have that innermost satisfaction of having helped this planet become a better place for all. So everybody wins heftily and nobody loses; what better bargain can you think of? In any event, I have had to move from the model of translation to that of mediation and extend it to cover literary writing, so as to assume full responsibility for the social consequences of my translation. I have decided to mediate between Pushkin and my readers. I have claimed also the right and accepted the responsibility to guess at the poet’s intention that led him to entertain his LPI and give it a certain form Fo, and I have also claimed the right and accepted the responsibility to guess my readers’ sensitivity and tastes, which I have presumed to be relevantly similar to my own. And I have claimed the right and accepted the responsibility to incur in all manner of adjustments, shifts and other modifications so as to make my LPIi “sound right.” In other words, © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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with the same indirect intended sense in mind, I have deemed the aesthetic effect of Fo to be more relevant than the semantic details of LPIo, and I have not hesitated to modify here and there what I had understood -my LPCo- as I tried to convey it to my readers as my LPIi. Another way of looking at it is that I have read the original with literary eyes and, once I had understood the LPIo as LPCo, I decided to communicate it to my readers as a poet as closely identified with Pushkin as I have managed to become. I have decided to produce a homoscopic, homofunctional translation, and that individual decision -for which, again, I assume full responsibility- has led me to understand that the sheer reproduction of the noetic plate of the LPIo is incompatible with my purpose. The great men of letters who have selftranslated have chosen (as far as I know, without exception, Nabokov himself included, as we shall see) to speak in the second language not so much from the LPIo as from the LPI tout court, renouncing the initial amalgam of the noetic plate and a formal plate in language o in order to try and amalgamate the abstract noetic plate with a formal plate in language i - a bit like the transcriptions for other instruments that great musicians have done of their own compositions. (And since I find it hard to let go of music, let me remind you yet again of a particularly telling case: Beethoven’s piano transcription of his violin concerto, which takes advantage, of course, of the vast harmonic possibilities of the new instrument, and neutralises its infinitely less warm sound.) The transcription of propositional content, as we have seen, normally poses no insurmountable problems: When re-expressing the principles and laws discovered by scientists there are, for all practical purposes, no real translation problems, and that is why, as I pointed out, there is but one science whether in Chinese or in Finnish. What presents the often insurmountable problem of the structural differences between languages is the “transcription” of the emotive harmonics that form makes vibrate - because it is simply impossible. In translation, those harmonics (which will always be a function of a language’s idiosyncrasy, the translator’s sensitivity and prowess, and, ultimately, the readers’ hermeneutic sensitivity and ability), can but be recreated. Let it be clear that it is never a matter of simply “clothing” an LPI as if form were but a cover thrown on top of the noetic mattress. Effective interlingual poetic mediation necessitates reliving the experience of literary writing - with a monumental difference, though: not in order to express whatever one wishes, but what has already been expressed; because, regardless of the aesthetic aspects of reverbalisation, translating is always to say in second language that which has been said in a first one. And we have not even touched upon the differences in sensitivity between the readers of the original and those of the translation, or even among those of a specific translation. I have burdened you with my own Spanish translation, so as to feel completely free to speak about the translator’s intentions. Let me now show my English corpus: 370

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Christopher Reid is the one translator who has ventured to “translate” the title: Unmistakable Not long ago, I dashed off some verses And had them printed without my name. Some bastard reviewer covered them with curses Anonymously, just the same! We’d both crossed one of nature’s laws: Such sly manoeuvres never pay. He’d known me at once by my terrible claws, While it was his ears gave him away.

I don’t like this translation: “Bastard” is totally out of register. The last strophe sounds disjointed; the seventh line is way too long, with a terribly unnecessary “terrible;” also, upon reaching “pay” I was expecting a resounding “bray” to finish the epigram in brilliant C major... but no: thematised “ears” are all but lost in the muddle of syllables. Pity! I have no particular quibbles with the delatinisation of the title: it is indeed more easily comprehensible, although I personally chose to stick to the original Latin. And now for Arndt’s own English “communicative” and “semantic” versions: One day I flicked my whip-o’-verse a little And let the thing go out without my name; Some scribbler pounced on it with ink and spittle; And had them print his piece unsigned, for shame. Oh, Lord! The hack or I had never reckoned That our generic marks gave us away: He knew me by my talons in a second, I knew him in an instant by his bray.

Not long ago I gave a little flick in verses And issued them without my signature: Some clown of a journalist printed a little piece about them, Releasing it without signature, the cad. But fancy! Neither I nor [that] gutter clown Succeeded in concealing our tricks: He knew me in a minute by my talons, I knew him by his ears right enough.

An interesting observation: those brackets around “that” in the semantic transcription are due to the fact that Russian has no articles. Every time that you see a definite or indefinite article in a translation from Russian, dear reader, the translator is lying in your face, but, more remarkably, nowhere in the original can we find “flick,” “whip,” “thing”, “ink,” “spittle,” “shame,” “Lord,” “generic marks,” “bray,” “second,” or “instant.” Whilst nowhere in the communicative translation do we see the “clown of a journalist,” the “gutter clown,” the verbs “to hide” and “to conceal,” the “pranks” or the “ears.” But none of those semantic (and, less perceptibly so, syntactic) shifts between Fo and Fi (or, rather, between Fi1 and Fi2) stand in the way of propositional LPIo/LPCi

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identity and, to boot, they allow for an almost perfect imitation of all relevant formal features. Pushkin’s Ex Unge Leonem and, except for the zoologically inconsistent “talons,” Arndt’s (and, regrettably, to a lesser extent, my own) are the same epigram in three languages. We say that the English and Spanish versions are translations of the Russian one because they reproduce in as many formal spaces the same noetic space, Pushkin’s LPIo, canonically verbalised in the poet’s beloved and admirable language. Here, as in most of the English translations above, we can legitimately speak of literary mediation as fully fledged recreation - which term cannot be applied to the French, Italian or Spanish versions of Oneguin, nor to Nabokov’s: I wish I had a manipulationist at hand to reassure him that this is a uncompromisingly descriptive statement, as is saying that, by the then prevailing standards and possibilities of shipbuilding, Titanic was a tragically defective liner. Here the so-called natural or native translation, i.e. the ability of any more or less normal bilingual to understand and express an LP is inconsequential. When a translator faces the need not only to re-express, but to re-express so as to move his reader, and to move him in an aesthetically analogous way, a whole series of factors enter into play that escaped García Landa’s model of prototypical translation. In this respect, we have seen that literary translation is by no means an exceptional case. Whenever a translator feels compelled to manipulate the formal space in order to convey the emotive harmonics of noetic content, he cannot but end up manipulating propositional content itself, not necessarily in order to say something that is propositionally different, but to reorganise that content and its semantic form by means of all manner of shifts, omissions, additions and changes in perspective. He is forced into it not only by the very nature if his new linguistic “instrument,” but also by the specific subjectivity of his new readers in the new situation. Nabokov redeemed May I round my argument by returning to my theoretical Dr. No. Let us take yet a look at one of Pushkin’s gems, a poem written for his wife (the one who cuckolded him famously with a French officer, thereby pushing him into the duel that cost him his life and us who knows how many further treasures). Porá, moj drug, porá! pokója clérdtse prósit Ljetját za dnjámi dnji, i kazhdyj chas unócit Chastíchku bytyjá, a my s tobój vdvojóm Prjedpolagájem zhyt, i gljad - kak raz umrjóm. Na svjétje schástja njet, no jest pokój i vólja. Davnó zvídnaja mjechtájhetsja mnje dólja Davnó, ustályj rab, zamýslyl ja pobjeg B obitjel dálnuju trudóv i chístykh njeg.

It’s time, my friend, it’s time! The heart asks for repose; Days fly after days, and each hour takes away A particle of life, and you and I together Propose to live, and look: precisely we die. On earth there is no happiness, but there’s repose and [freedom. For long of an enviable lot have I been dreaming; For long, exhausted slave, I have been planning to flee To a remote refuge of works and pure delights.

No, the Nabokovian translation above is not by Nabokov. What he deigned to pen was this other one: 372

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’Tis time, my dear, ’tis time. The heart demands repose. Day after day flits by, and with each hour there goes A little bit of life: but meanwhile you and I Together plan to dwell... yet lo! ’tis when we die. There is no bliss on earth: there’s peace and freedom, though. An enviable lot I long have yearned to know: Long have I, weary slave, been contemplating flight To a remote abode of work and pure delight.

May the Gods forgive me, but I find this translation far superior to the original itself! And no, it is not a miracle, it is simply a statistically exceptional case: it is very rare indeed that a translator can match wits and prowess with a great poet - let alone, as in this specific case, surpass him. All that a great translation of a great work takes, as we can see, is the right approach and the right translator - the latter being, of course, less readily available a commodity than the former. Not that Nabokov has abjured from his semantomaniac tenet, though. The translation appears in his 1965 prologue to the revision of his 1936 Despair, a self-translation of his 1934 novel Otcháyanie - “a far more sonorous howl”. This is the way he explains his seeming apostasy: “The line and fragments of lines Hermann mutters in Chapter Four come from Pushkin’s short poem... I give it here in full, in my own translation, with the retention of measure and rhyme, a course that is seldom advisable -nay, admissible- except at a very special conjunction of stars in the firmament of the poem, as obtains here.” [Nabokov 1981:11]

For starters, Nabokov failed -nay, refused- to follow his vaunted method in translating his own novel: his English Despair is masterful, and nowhere, not once, not even in the overtly translated Pushkin lines, does he give his reader the least glimpse of the fact that he is, indeed, reading a translation. I suggest, therefore, that that “special conjunction of stars in the firmament of the poem” had very much to do with the fact that it would have been completely dreadful to have the protagonist, an emigré longing for mother Russia, mutter an equally dreadful semantic translation of the poet’s great lines. Nabokov was too refined a writer and his English version of the novel too perfect a star-filled firmament to have it mauled by an awkward translation of somebody else’s poem. So when it came to translate himself, Nabokov chose most naturally to do it homoscopically and homofunctionally, including the quotation from Pushkin. Why then did he deny such privilege to Pushkin outside his own, Nabokov’s, novel? ¿Why did he give up on “true translation” when translating Nabokov? I have become wary of translators who preach a method when it comes to translating others, but will have nothing of it when the ones to be translated are they themselves: what is good for the translated poet’s goose, methinks, ought to be as right for the translator’s own gander.

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Now, apart from their different talent and honesty, why do literary translators evince such an enormous spectrum of outlook? To answer this crucial question, we better step down from the lyrical clouds to cast a glance at pedestrianly pragmatic texts. The decisive difference is the one I mentioned at the end of Chapter I: despite the increasing proletarisation of translators, including those who translate literature, in our profit-driven capitalist society authentic literary translation is mostly a labour of love (even love of oneself, as we can see), hard and poorly paid; pragmatic translation is done by command and for money. Faced with an original, the pragmatic translator’s decisive question is no longer “what does the author say?” but rather “why am I paid to translate this?” Barring a few exceptions, a translator of pragmatic texts does not give a hoot about the original: He reads it because he must translate it (and no matter how much translation teachers may insist, he normally reads it as he translates it); he translates it because he is paid, whatever his personal feelings toward both content and form; and he translates as speedily as possible: in the market time is money, quality - not so much. In the case of conference interpreters this is all the more clear. A traditional literary translator, instead, reads both as a normal reader, for his own pleasure, and writes as a normal writer, for the pleasure of others as well as for his own. Oftentimes -as Luther, as Lu Xun, as Nabokov or as Venuti- he even translates out of his own ideological agenda. As we can see, the main difference lies already with WZ and Yy. What interests me, then, is whether the model aptly describes and explains all these radically different translations of literary works, and whether it actually helps assessing them. I believe that it does. I believe, moreover, that, regardless of their more and less felicitous moments, they all more or less handsomely pass García Landa’s litmus test: LPIo=LPCi, by virtue of which we can call them (good or bad, functional or non-functional, homoscopic or heteroscopic) translations. Hereafter, all aesthetic value judgements depart from translatology proper along the rails of literary criticism and only a model of literary translation as literary mediation is powerful enough to carry the day. You will, I hope, have excused me for having imitated more or less (you cannot imitate otherwise) in English the semantic form of the originals and of the metric translations into other languages. My only purpose has been not to exclude those readers who are not conversant with Russian, French, Spanish or Italian, and, as a bonus, to show more evidently the modifications that translators have had to pay as the price for their imitation of lyric form. In no way am I claiming that a poem must be translated in verse, much less that there must be maximum rhythmic or phonic similarity or equivalence (especially when it comes to rhyme). What I am referring to is the aesthetic comparability of the translator’s experience, the effects that he now intends to produce in his readers, and the effects that he actually achieves by means of his verbalisation. The first identity, LPIo/LPCo can normally only be hoped for, since the absence of the poet and the disappearance of the original situation GTPMVHtm leave the 374

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translator alone in the face of Fo. Unlike the interpreter, he cannot “decipher” it in its own original situation: Now he must lay hands upon all his relevant knowledge (philological, literary, historic, sociologic, cultural, geographic, etc.) so as, insofar as humanly possible, to reconstruct the GTPM and re-establish the relevant pre-comprehension schemes (which is often impossible, whence the hypothetical nature of so many exegeses and translations). On the basis of this encyclopaedic knowledge -and of this ability to find out- he then must put to test his ability to write as a poet, to transmute his LPCo into LPIi so as to produce, in such an Fi as -in a new act of writing DTi, addressed to the new readers awaiting him at the other shore of the new series of situations GLin,- will successfully help produce an LPCi relevantly identical to LPCo. (Isolated from the author who speaks to him through his text and from the readers who will listen to him through his own, the translator, especially the literary translator, is a lonely being, a mediator between unknown magnitudes, a patient hermeneut and a timidly temerarious scribe. No wonder that his profile is so different from that of the simultaneous interpreter, that acrobat astride two steeds of uneven and not always parallel gait, exposed to the applause or jeering of the circus crowd.) Irreconcilable differences So far, the morphosemantic, syntactic and phonetic idiosyncrasy of Russian did not present attributes that were altogether impossible to imitate. True, the phonemic and phonetic variety of Russian offers many more possibilities of marking form than poor Spanish’s system of five vowels and, at best, seventeen consonants that are loath to cluster. Spanish makes less noise than Russian, English, Italian or French, and therefore does not really lend itself as readily to onomatopoeia, alliterations and other acoustic effects. Neither does it favour oxytonic rhymes, and even less so the alternation of oxytonic and paroxytonic rhymes so characteristic of Russian poetry. To make things even worse, in my language verbal endings (past participles in “-àdo” and “-ìdo,” infinitives in “àr,” “-èr” and “-ìr,” etc.), adverbs in “-mènte,” abstract nouns in “-dàd,” “ción,” etc., and many other words that in other languages vary greatly, all rhyme. When it comes to rhyming, then, Spanish -and therefore poets writing in Spanish- cannot dream of boasting the wealth that any Russian speaker can voice at any clause. Even so, as we have seen, with a little bit of luck and effort (not always successful or discrete) it is possible. Where Spanish cannot imitate Russian is in its proparoxytonic and pro-proparoxytonic rhymes, which in turn offer the possibility of producing rhyming compounds. Let us take the final lines of Majakovski’s Khorosho (“good” or “well”): Ljet do stá rastí nam bjes stárosti. God ot góda rastí náshej bódrosti.

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Sláv’te mólot i stikh zjemlí mólodosti.

Which a sober English speaker would verbalise perhaps thus: We shall live a hundred years without becoming old. Our boldness shall grow from year to year. Long live the hammer and verse of the land of youth!

Again, the translation I have suggested, faithfully reproduces the LPI’s noetic plate. If you have understood it, dear reader, you have understood what Majakovski says. Bravo! So what? Noetically speaking, Majakovski does not say anything particularly original: the originality lies squarely on the formal “relief” of the plate; and this relief is concentrated entirely in a) the particular metre (consistent of a constant number of tonic stresses, regardless of the number of syllables - the poet’s own invention) and the compound rhymes (which became his speciality). We can imitate the stress pattern (except that the line will never sound natural), but the compound rhymes... not in a million years! In Spanish there is simply no way to amalgamate more than two lexemes into one phonetic word, and one of them must be an unstressed grammatical particle. Witness this little exercise: La pena mi mano lame y echada a mis pies está. Me mira con ojos tiernos que sólo a mí saben ver. Nos une esta tarde gris. Te recuerdo mudo y triste, triste, mudo, gris y solo, que a la cita no acudiste y mi pobre cuore no lo alcanza a paliar con nada. No es lluvia de afuera la que empaña ya mi mirada y los versos que me saque sabrán a pena mojada.

Sorrow licks my hand and lies at my feet. She looks at me with tender eyes that can only see me. We are united by this grey afternoon. I remember you silent ant sad, sad, silent, grey and lonely, for you did not keep our date and my wretched heart is not able to palliate it with anything. It is not an outside rain that which mists now my gaze, and the verses it may ferret out of me will taste of wet sorrow.

No twisting of the English language will allow me to show you in English what my compound rhymes sound like in Spanish. I just made the transcription in such a way that every other line would end on an unstressed word so as to give you an idea. Unless you know Spanish, you must take my word: it cannot be done. Does this mean that Majakovski’s poem is untranslatable into Spanish? No; its noetic content is perfectly reverbalisable. Yes; its aesthetic form is impossible to imitate in many relevant details. What to do? I do not have the answer, other than harp on the fact that one is to do whatever allows for the highest degree of relevant identity. To provide it we need a poet who can manipulate Spanish with the same virtuosity that Majakovski showed in 376

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Russian, equipped with the relevant linguistic and extralinguistic hermeneutic package and an adequate sensitivity - and duly motivated. He has not shown up so far, but it is quite possible that he eventually may: the further corroboration of this theory awaits him. Meanwhile, let us content ourselves with (or rather, resign ourselves to) more often than not clumsy translations by translators illserviced by both nature and nurture. My only hope is that this model will help that those really able give us ever more apt translations. If you wonder why I have inflicted upon you so many Russian examples, remember it is not out of conceit, but because I know a language that most of my presumed readers will not understand, so as to force them to read the translations not as “paths” to the original, as Ortega y Gasset put it, but as the original itself. Depending on your tastes, preferences, knowledge or affinities, you may choose one over the others. They all have their strengths and weaknesses, and it would be ideal to marry the best of each. If, as I hope, you cannot read Russian, dear reader, all the formal features will have escaped you that can only be perceived in Russian, among them many that only Russian readers equipped with the necessary hermeneutic package can perceive. Following García Landa, I maintain that communication consists in mutually producing speech percepts, and that, for the subject, that which is not perceived is as good as nonexistent. The only access that we have to a -by definition, subjective- LPI is a -by definition, also subjective- LPC, and their identity is impossible to verify empirically, as is the case with the identity between the image verbally described to a blind person and the percept that such description creates in his mind. Even so, there are reasonable inferences that whole groups of readers surely make and others that they do not. It all basically depends on the specific reader’s K, P, M and U, i.e. on his cognitive and emotional ability, his intelligence, knowledge and sensitivity, as activated in a specific situation G - it is all a function of the specific hermeneutic package governed by a due unconscious predisposition Z to understand here and now. And now for some Shakespeare This book on translation theory would not be worthy of its name if it were not sprinkled with the due drops of translations of the Bard. Let us therefore exhume Sonnet CXXXVIII: Sonnet CXXXVIII When my love swears that she is made of truth, I do believe her, though I know she lies, That she might think me some untutor’d youth, Unlearned in the world’s false subtleties. Thus vainly thinking that she thinks me young, Although she knows my days are past the best, Simply I credit her false-speaking tongue: On both sides thus is simple truth suppress’d. © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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But wherefore says she not she is unjust? And wherefore say not I that I am old? O, love’s best habit is in seeming trust, And age in love loves not to have years told: Therefore I lie with her and she with me, And in our faults by lies we flattered be.

This is a typical Elizabethan sonnet, differing from the Spanish import in its strophic scheme. The typographical layout conflating the first twelve iambic pentameters and indenting the last two is conventional. The two quartets and two tercets of the Romance sonnet become a series of three four-line groups and a final couplet. Also, each of the groups has its own rhyme scheme. A translator wishing to translate this sonnet homofunctionally into Spanish must begin by deciding between adopting the vernacular scheme and imitating the original one. Both solutions can be defended: If Shakespeare had written in Spanish, his sonnets would be structurally similar to those by Lope de Vega or Calderón de la Barca, but the English sonnets he did write are not like those by Lope and Calderón. The different strophic layout, however, tends to impose a certain organisation of the noetic content: The three quatrains of the Elizabethan Sonnet are normally noetically self-contained, whereas the isolated final pair is normally more autonomous. The Romance sonnet is strophically more evenly balanced: As a rule, the two quatrains make up the noetic “exposition” whilst the following couple of tercets serve as “dénoument” cum “coda.” In this specific instance, as can be readily seen. the Elizabethan form is better suited to the poem’s content. This is, perhaps, the decisive reason to keep it. Moving now to the noetic plate, maybe the Bard did, and again maybe he did not, consciously mean to play on the different meanings of “to lie.” The fact remains that the ambiguity is there (otherwise I could not have perceived it). Spanish words being on average longer than their English counterparts, and with a greater number of morphemic and syntactic markers, there is no way that the same semantic potential can be actualised in the same number of syllables. Even if the translator chooses the fourteen-syllable alexandrine (which grants him 52 additional syllables, i.e. 23% more than the fourteen hendecasyllables), Spanish will fall short: either he condenses or he gives up on the sonnet form. In a bilingual edition of the Bard’s complete poems, Fátima Auad and Pablo Mañé Garzón hit us with the following monstrosity (it figures: they have translated all of his poems, so they must not have had much time to devote individually to each piece): Cuando mi amada jura que está hecha de sinceridad, realmente le creo, aunque sé que miente; para dejarle creer que soy un joven desaconsejado, poco diestro en las supercherías del mundo, pienso así vanamente que me cree joven, aunque ella sabe que han pasado mis mejores años. Ingenuamente, doy crédito a su falsa lengua, de una y otra parte negamos la sencilla verdad;

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When my beloved swears that she is made of sincerity I really believe her, though I know she lies; To let her believe that I am an unwise youth, Not all too skilful in the tricks of the world, I think thus vainly that she believes me to be young, Although she knows that my best years are past. Naively, I give her false tongue credit, From one part and the other we deny simple truth;

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pero ¿por qué ella no dice que es inicua? ¿Y por qué no digo yo que yo soy viejo? ¡Oh!, porque una confianza aparente es la mejor conducta en el amor, y la edad en el amor no quiere que se sumen los años. Por lo tanto yo miento con ella y ella conmigo, y nuestros defectos mediante mentiras halagamos.

But why does she no say that she is unfair? And why do I not say that I am old? Oh, because a seeming trust is the best behaviour in love, And age in love does not want years to be added. Therefore I lie with her and she with me, And our shortcomings by means of lies we please.

I shall waste no time analysing this catastrophe. I only brought it in to contrast it with Agustín García Calvo’s: Cuando jura mi amor que su fe es como el cielo de firme, yo la creo, bien que sé que miente, para que ella me crea un infeliz mozuelo, del mundo y sus perversidades inocente.

When my love swears that her faith is as firm As the sky, I believe her, though I know she lies, So that she believe me to be a poor youth, Of the world and its perversity innocent.

Así, creyendo en vano que ella me cree joven, bien que sabe que es ida la flor de mis años, yo, simple, de su lengua bebo los engaños, y sufre la verdad que aquí y allí la roben.

Thus, believing vainly that she believes me to be young, Though she knows that the flower of my years is gone, I, simple, drink the deceptions from her tongue, And truth suffers that it here and there is stolen.

Pero ¿por qué ella no declara que ella es falsa? Pero ¿por qué no digo yo que yo soy viejo? Ah, que en amor la pura fe es la mejor salsa, y edad no quiere Amor contar en su cortejo.

But why does she not declare that she is false? But why do I not say that I am old? Ah, that in love pure faith is the best sauce, And Love does not wish to tell age in its wooing.

Conque ella en mí, y yo en ella, así con trampa entramos, y nuestras faltas con embustes adobamos.

So she in me, and I in her, thus cheating get in, And our faults with strings of lies we season.

The translation leaves a lot to be desired (as so many by translators such as myself, more keen than talented). Straight-jacketed into Spanish, the translator opts for a more spacious thirteen-syllable verse (the alexandrine would have been a less idiosyncratic choice), but keeps the English architecture - if laid out rather eclectically, with three separate quartets and an independent couplet. The initial enjambment seems awkward (Shakespeare’s sonnets, after all, have no titles and are recognised by their first line). The gastronomic slant of “salsa” [sauce] and “adobamos” [season] does not sit well either, having nothing to do with the original. At first reading, the line “Pero ¿por qué ella no declara que es falsa?” sounds contrived, but followed immediately by its parallel “Pero ¿por qué no digo yo que yo soy viejo?” it achieves a baroque effect similar to the original. The verb “declarar,” however, with its judicial and assertive connotations, is not adequate; still, within these limitations, there are redeeming moments, especially in the subtle erotic allusion in the next to last line (reflecting the ambiguity of “to lie”). In all, though, this is a dreadful Spanish sonnet. As a matter of fact it is because I found it so wanting that I decided to try my teeth at it. My motivation was multiple: to prove that it can be done, to prove that I can do it myself with a modicum of dignity, to give a decent taste of Shakespeare to a polysystem where good translations are at a premium... and, yes, with a view to illustrate my own theory. Let me take you back in time and © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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into my kitchen: I will try to retain the hendecasyllable together with the baroque flavour, which comes mainly from the repetitions and parallel constructions that I find so wonderful and congenial, without doing violence to the solidarity between line and syntax. I know beforehand that I shall have to throw overboard more than half the semantic potential, that I will have no choice but maximally to condense the verbalisation of the noetic plate, i.e. that I must convey the same LP with less semes (the poetic translation of poetry, as we had seen, requires an approach remarkably similar to its very opposite at the other end of the interlingual mediation spectrum - simultaneous interpretation). This should come as no surprise: relevance works always in analogous ways. I will choose to imitate the Elizabethan sonnet form, again for two reasons, one less dignified than the other: a) I want to show its formal differences from its Spanish counterpart, b) its more lax rhyme structure frees me from an additional and cumbersome formal limitation. Whatever I do at the formal level, in order to succeed, I must make my reader understand what I understood as I read the original and move him as much as I was moved while understanding. I am perfectly aware that each act of reading (by me, by my readers, of the original, of the translation) is unique. Maybe my translation is better or, more probably, worse than I think it is, but that is a moot question. So here it is: Cuando mi amada jura que no miente la creo aun sabiendo que es mentira, porque me crea un joven inocente que no ve la perfidïa que mira. Y así, creyendo que me cree mozo, bien que sé que ella sabe de mis años, yo creo simplemente a su rebozo y ambas bocas se cruzan con engaños. Mas ¿por qué no admite ella que perjura? (¿por qué no admito yo que soy añejo?) ¡Ah!, en falsa fe ve Amor su mejor cura: Amor no ama que le digan viejo. A una, pues, los dos, los dos mentimos: y mintiendo las culpas nos cubrimos.

When my love swears that she does not lie, I do believe her if knowing it’s a lie, That she may believe that I am a naive youth Who does not see the evil that he is looking at. And thus, believing she believes me to be young, Though I know that she knows about my years, I simply accept her simulation And both mouths meet with deceit. But wherefore admits she not that she forswears? (Wherefore admit not I that I am old?) Ah, in fake faith doth Love see its best care: Love loves not to be told it’s old. At once, thus, both, both of us lie, And, lying, each other’s guilt disguise.

It can be done, right? And, as Etkind expostulates, if it can, it must! Let me point out first that, short of phonic space, I had to omit, alas, the syntactic coherence marker at the beginning of the 10th line (crucial because of the effect it produces), so I opted for prosodic marking: the brackets are meant to convey a more subdued intonation, as if an aside on stage - I displace coherence from Fi(SmH) to Cn, except that many readers will probably not put typographic and paralinguistic C together. More interestingly, a funny thing happened as I worked on the above semantic back-translation, whose only purpose is to give the reader an idea of the “liberties” I was forced to take (how can one be forced 380

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to exercise one’s liberty?): I felt as if the sonnet was so close by that I could just bend, push or stretch my verbalisation just a bit and I would be right there... No, not in Shakespeare’s sonnet, but in an English sonnet of my own, remarkably similar to, if much worse than, the Bard’s. This is undoubtedly sheer chance: The (my) semantic translation imperceptibly slides into iambic pentameters, as if the lines refused to sound uncouth and hostile. Maybe unconsciously I did resist producing an unliterary translation of a literary utterance that I hold extremely dear (it is, so far, my very best effort); if so, that is all in my unconscious motivation, about which I can tell you nothing, dear reader... because it is unconscious. What do you think? In any event, I have ended with several verbalisations of Shakespeare’s LPI. Only one of them is by the Bard himself; the last twain are mine - they are, all, verbalisations of the same LP, but the original is by far the best. It need not have been so: if Shakespeare had been translating me, his would have been undoubtedly a better version, maybe even better -who knows?- than his own original. Be that as it may, the weak implicature arisen from the homophony of both verbs “to lie” and lost in Spanish reappears through no special prowess that I boast in English and lack in my own mother tongue. Was Shakespeare aware of it? Who knows? Who cares... now? We are left with nothing but our own understanding of what he meant to say, our own inference of what he intended us to understand with the few words he has bequeathed us. By the way, the last line of my back translation into English, I dare say, is even more “interesting” than the Bard’s - if that is indeed the case, it is not my merit but the English language’s: I was simply back-translating literally. If I had passed my original translation as a translation of this one, many a critic would scold me for not having respected the play on words! It sounds preposterous, but it is not. The model of the act of written speech explains it: Faced with but the linguistic chain, the reader -in this case years and miles away from the unavailable speaker, in a completely new social situation and with his own hermeneutic package- proceeds to infer the LPIo and, on that basis, the all-important indirect intended sense. Competing interpretations are but differences in this inference process, which, as any theory, can be disproved, but never totally borne out (Popper 1994)opper 1994). I do think and hope that I did indeed understand what Shakespeare meant me, one of his readers, to understand, i.e. that his LPIo is identical to my LPCo. Now, however, I wish to do something other than merely let my Spanish reader understand what I understood. I want to move him as much as I was moved. If I have succeeded at making him understand what Shakespeare said, then my effort is, indeed, a translation, whatever its poetic inanity. If not, then it is but a more or less failed attempt, regardless of its poetic value. As I was saying, however, that is not all I wanted to do: I wanted to affect my reader the way I myself am affected by this poem, by this wonderful LPIo so admirably verbalised in such a beautiful Fo. I wanted not only to communicate to him what Shakespeare said: I wanted to give him an idea of how marvellously

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he managed to say it. This has forced me into many compromises, as a result of which I have produced, I hope, not so much a prototypical reverbalisation of the Bard’s LPIi, but as equally poetic a verbalisation of it as I am capable of at this time. My aim, in other words, has been not so much to translate in the prototypical sense of the word, but to mediate between the poet and my reader for the good of all three of us. I leave you to dissect my translation and find its many faults: they are literary - I am indeed no Shakespeare. Yet it is, I dare believe, the Bard’s sonnet in Spanish, or, if you prefer (as I do) a possible, recognisable Spanish verbalisation of the LP he verbalised in his Sonnet CXXXVIII. Of course, Shakespeare and, above all, the Spanish language, deserve and await a truly great translation. Perhaps with more minute and spaced efforts I may be able to improve mine, but since my skopos is simply illustrative, let me stop here and go on with this book that I am whispering in your ear. I do hope, however, that I have helped bear out that a good literary translation, as a good marriage, may be difficult but it is nevertheless possible. Now, my dear reader, do with it what you wish: place it in a corpus, find all the relevant norms, check whether the receiving polysystem considers it a translation... If you would even like to know what my neurons were doing at the time, I would be happy to help you if I can. An extreme case I have before me a book in French. This book has, of course, locked in its pages an utterance giving birth to a gigantic act of speech, in turn composed of several speech acts by several different speakers, but let us proceed step by step. The cover is completely white, with the following inscriptions: LA DISPARITION (in black) GEORGES PEREC (in red) L’IMAGINAIRE (in red) GALLIMARD (in black)

In the back (white) the ‘text’ is the same as in the cover. The inner cover reads as follows: GEORGES PEREC (in red) and below: La disparition (in relief, i.e. white on white: as if the title were vanishing from the page, and, in black): Trahir qui disparut, dans La disparition, ravirait au lisant subtil tout plaisir. Motus donc, sur l’inconnu noyau manquant - ‘un rond pas tout à fait clos finissant par un trait horizontal’ -, blanc sillon damnatif où s’abîma un Anton Voyl, mais d’où surgit aussi la fiction. Disons, sans plus, qu’il a rapport à la vocalisation. L’aiguillon paraîtra à d’aucuns trop grammatical. Vain soupçon : contraint par son savant pari à moult combinaisons, allusions, substitutions ou circonlocutions, jamais G.P. n’arracha au banal discours joyaux plus brillants ni si purs. Jamais plus fol alibi n’accoucha d’avatars si mirobolants. Oui, il

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fallait un grand art, un art hors du commun, pour fourbir tout un roman sans ça! [To reveal who has disappeared, in The Disappearance, would deprive a subtle reader from all pleasure. Mutis, then, about the missing unknown knot - ‘a not quite closed circle ending in a horizontal stroke,’ white trace of the perdition in which Anton Voyl got lost, but also whence fiction arises. Let us simply say that it has to do with vocalisation. Some may find the spur all too grammatical. Vain suspicion: limited by his scholarly wager on multiple combinations, allusions, substitutions or circumlocutions, G. P. has never reaped from trivial discourse such shining and pure pearls. Never so lunatic an alibi has engendered such magnificent avatars. Indeed, great art was required, an art out of the ordinary, to adorn a whole novel without that!]

At the bottom of the page, the bar code and other identifying figures are all in black. Now it is normal for texts to be black on white, and for the name of the author, the title of the work and the name of the publisher to appear in different colours. From the standpoint of C and E, this book does not seem to hold any relevant intentionality, although if you take a closer look, there is a clue already in the back cover, but let us open it: after a blank page, the first printed page reads just: COLLECTION L’IMAGINAIRE (both words in red). Nothing on the other side. The next page has the following text: Georges Perec (in red) La disparition (in black) Denoël (in red). The following page with text (all of it in red) carries a bibliographic summary that begins: L’oeuvre de Georges Perec (1936-1982). So far, the ‘author’ of the text is the publisher. Beginning in the next page and up to the last of the novel that begins a page later, all the text is black. In this page preceding the novel proper one can read the following sonnet (in black): La Disparition Un corps noir tranchant un flamant au vol bas, un bruit fruit au sol (qu’avant son parcours lourd dorait un son crissant au grain d’air) il court portant son sang plus loin son charbon qui bat Si nul n’allait brillant sur lui pas à pas dur ciel aujourd’hui plomb au fil du bras gourd Si tombait nu grillon dans l’hors vu au sourd mouvant bâillon du gris hasard sans compas l’alpha signal inconstant du vrai diffus qui saurait (saisissant (un doux soir confus ainsi on croit voir un pont à son galop)

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un non qu’à ton stylo tu donnas brûlant) qu’ici on dit (par un trait manquant plus clos) l’art toujours su du chant-combat (noir pour blanc) J.Roubaud

which I shan’t try to translate even in prose, since I do not understand a word of it. Still, the clue seems to hold. As I said, the next page is already the beginning of the novel (again, all in black): AVANT-PROPOS Où l’on saura plus tard qu’ici s’inaugurait la Damnation Trois cardinaux, un rabbin, un amiral franc-maçon, un trio d’insignifiants politicards soumis au bon plaisir d’un trust anglo-saxon, on fait savoir à la population par radio, puis par placards, qu’on risquait la mort par inanition. On crut d’abord à un faux bruit. Il s’agissait, disait-on, d’intoxication. Mais l’opinion suivit. Chacun s’arma d’un fort gourdin. “Nous voulons du pain”, criait la population, conspuant patrons, nantis, pouvoirs publics. ‫ا‬a complotait, ça conspirait partout. Un flic n’osait plus sortir la nuit. A mâcon, on attaqua un local administratif. A Rocamadour, on pilla un stock : on y trouva du thon, du lait, du chocolat par kilos, du maïs par quintaux, mais tout avait l’air pourri. A Nancy, on guillotina sur un rond-point vingt-six magistrats d’un coup, puis on brûla un journal du soir qu’on accusait d’avoir prit parti pour l’administration. Partout on prit d’assaut docks, hangars ou magasins.

Nabokov -and Newmark- would have approved a translation such as the following: [PREFACE In which later will be known that here began the condemnation Three cardinals, a rabbi, a Freemason admiral, a trio of insignificant politicasters subject to the whim of an Anglo-Saxon trust, have informed the population over the radio, then through posters, that there was an imminent danger of death through starvation. At first it was believed that it was a false rumour. It was, they said, a matter of food poisoning, but the opinion went on. Each one armed himself with a big club. ‘We want bread,’ demanded the population, cursing the bosses, the wealthy and the public powers. There were plots and conspiracies everywhere. A cop no longer dared go out at night. In Mâcon an administrative building was attacked. In Rocamadour, a warehouse was pillaged in which there turned out to be tuna, milk, pounds of chocolate, quintals of corn, but everything looked rancid. In Nancy twenty-six magistrates were guillotined at once in a gazebo, later an evening newspaper accused of having sided with the administration was burnt. Everywhere piers, hangars or storehouses were taken by storm.]

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The LPIo shines through quite clearly, although its verbalisation suffers from a certain idiosyncrasy bordering on clumsiness. The a-systematic use of the verbal tenses does not quite fit. Why “pouvoirs publics” rather than simply “gouvernement?” Why twice “population” and not once “peuple” or “gens?” The phrase “un flic n’osait plus sortir la nuit” is befuddling: Why “un flic” and not “les flics”? Why “flic” instead of “gendarme” or “agent de police”? Either we have misunderstood, or the author has a strange way with words, or there is more than meets the eye, i.e. an intention to produce a certain effect. If there is such an intention, it must be sought behind the LPIo (in WZ and/or Yy). If such intention is dismissed, then a translator bent on making understandable Perec’s direct intended sense could translate as follows: Three cardinals, a rabbi, a trio of petty politicians subject to the whim of an Anglo-Saxon trust informed the populace at first over the radio and later by posters that there is a danger of starvation. Initially it was thought to be a false rumour. It was, they said, a matter of food poisoning, but then the situation got out of hand. Everybody armed themselves with heavy clubs. ‘We want bread!’ demanded the people, cursing the bosses, the wealthy and the authorities. There were plots and conspiracies everywhere. The police dared not go out at night any more. In Macon, an administrative building was attacked; in Rocamadour, a warehouse was ransacked where there turned out to be tuna, milk, chocolate and corn, but everything looked rancid. In Nancy, twenty-six magistrates were guillotined together, after which the crowd burnt down an evening newspaper accused of having sided with the Administration. Piers, hangars and storehouses were taken by storm all over the place.

No doubt any good simultaneous or consecutive interpreter who has read the original piece would produce an Fi very similar to this one. García Landa would have applauded, but let us finish the book: Up to page 312, where the novel ends, the whole text is in black. From page 313 to page 316, it is all in red. Under the title Métagraphes (citations) come several short extracts by different authors (Tardieu, Nerval, Holland, De Maistre, Baron, Sade) and a most curious Anglo-Indian proverb: “Even for a word we would not waste a vowel”. On page 317 we can read, in red, the title TABLE, followed by the contents in black, except that on page 318 there appear once more in red the two final sections and the epigraph: “Au Moulin d’Andé (1968).” Here the book proper ends. Then comes a blank page followed by six unnumbered pages with the author’s bibliography and the L’IMAGINAIRE collection’s catalogue (its author once again the publisher). So we have in red the author’s name, the collection’s title (but not the publisher’s name) and the initial bibliographic summary. Then the preface, the sonnet and the whole novel come in black. Then red again for the citations, the table of content’s “title,” the last two sections and the epigraph. My question is, what is that red ink doing so unevenly sprinkled here and there? If you analyse closely all these data about the interplay of F, C and E, you may discover the reason behind this puzzling © 2006 Frank & Timme Verlag für wissenschaftliche Literatur

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dichromy. Before I reveal the enigma, however, let us take an even closer look. The novel tells about the search for one Anton Voyl. Voyl is the victim of a hallucination in which, while walking past a shelf holding a series of 26 numbered volumes, realises that number five is missing. The novel has 26 chapters, except that it too jumps from chapter four to chapter six. One of the characters looking for Voyl is called Amaury Conson, another, who has a cameo appearance, is Gadsby V. Wright. I learn from Hofstadter 1997 that Ernst Vincent Wright is an obscure Californian scribe who in the 30’s penned a novel, Gadsby, without the letter e. Voyl... Conson... voyelle, consonne... number 5... number 26... The letter e! The passage above, as the rest of the novel -and the preface, and the sonnet, and everything that is not in black- has no e’s55! That is the reason for the strange quirks, the circumlocutions, the rather awkward way of verbalising meaning meant - the author means to say in a most definite way without one of the vowels. And both the first translation, faithful to semantic form, and the second one, faithful to noetic content, end up betraying that intention behind meaning meant - they end up betraying, in other words, the author’s meaning to do by saying, and therefore do not ensure relevant identity between LPIo and LPCi. Can this novel be translated into Spanish while respecting the same constraint or one more or less analogous? In principle, once the translator has made Perec’s motivation and intention his own, it is all a matter of wits, of overcoming the hurdles one by one. Except that, since those hurdles will be much more plentiful than in French, the translator will have to manipulate his LPIi at every single step, adapting it to the supreme intention of producing the specific formal effect. For starters, he will have to change the title, and then manage to make clear the correlation between the number of volumes on the shelf, the number of chapters in the novel, and the number of letters in the Spanish alphabet, otherwise the clue ceases to be functional. As it happens Spanish has the letters ch, ll, ñ and rr that do not exist in French; but rr is never used at the beginning of a word, so it does not have its own page in the dictionary. To make things even more complicated, the Royal Academy has now abolished ch, but it will take time for most readers to find out and then get used to the idea. So how may volumes and how many chapters in the Spanish novel? How to add or subtract them? In any event, a Russian translator will have an even harder task: his alphabet counts thirty-three letters, with a more common soft and a less common hard e, respectively in the sixth and 31st place. And how are translators supposed to translate it into Hebrew or Arabic, which have no vowels, or into Chinese, that does not even have letters? But let us stick to Spanish. Think, my reader, a whole 300-page novel without a third of the 55

It seems, according to Hofstadter, that in the German translation there is one “e,” which the translator lets intentionally through because he discovered that Perec did so also in the original (and it seems also that no one has set about reading the novel searching for that lonely e. I certainly do not intend to). 386

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infinitives, the prepositions “de,” “en” and “desde”; without the definite article “el,” the relative pronouns “que,” “quien” and “quienes,” the demonstrative pronouns “este,” “ese” and “aquel,” with their respective plurals and feminines, and so forth and so on and etcetera! And not just any which novel a writer might choose to write - Perec’s novel! Except that Perec has at his disposal a language that allows him to dispense with the letter e much more comfortably, through all manner of contractions and apocopations, whilst in order to get away with it, his Spanish translator will need more wits and more wit - and even then, who knows whether he would manage relevantly enough. That is his luck - we are left with the problem. And a decisive problem it is: unless that or a relevantly similar constraint is adopted56, the reverbalisation of LPI as Fi makes no sense at all, since it would not produce any relevant effects on the new reader - there would be no relevant LPIo/LPCi identity: mediation would have failed even if translation had succeeded. So here is the mystery of untranslatability mostly dispelled: translation, as defined by García Landa, i.e. identity between LPIo and LPCi is, in principle, always possible. What can be impossible, rather, is effective mediation, i.e. relevant identity between LPIo and LPCi - the noetic plate can be reverbalised, but it does not serve any useful purpose, so why bother in the first place? Fine, but can this novel be relevantly translated into Spanish? Let me try: Dos obispos, un rabino, un comodoro masón y un trío formado por nimios políticos sumisos a un trust anglosajón han comunicado a la población por radio y pancartas la inanición próxima y total. Un rumor, nos dijimos al principio, a lo más, intoxicación. Mas la alarma acabó por cundir. Salíamos todos armados con palos. “¡Pan!” clamaba la población culpando a patronos, acomodados y funcionarios. Todo mundo conspiraba y complotaba. La policía solo osaba patrullar a la luz diurna. Por Macón asaltaron un local administrativo. Por Rocamadour arrasaron con un silo. Hallaron allí sustancias varias: atún, viandas y cacao por kilos, maíz y trigo por arrobas, mas todo rancio, podrido, mohoso. Nancy: Junto al juzgado 26 magistrados linchados a una, y, para colmo, aniquilado un “pasquín” por oficialista y adicto a la corrupta administración. A lo largo y a lo ancho asaltado todo hangar, galpón o botica. [Two bishops, a rabbi, a francmason commodore and a trio composed by petty politicians submissive to an Anglo-Saxon trust have communicated to the population through the wireless and banners imminent and total starvation. A rumour, we all said to ourselves at first; at most, intoxication. But the alarm ended up spreading. We would all go out armed with clubs. “Bread!” demanded the populace blaming bosses, the well-off and civil servants. Everybody conspired and plotted. The police only dared patrol in the day light. At Macon they set ablaze an administrative building. At Rocamadour 56

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they destroyed a silo. They found there sundry substances: tuna fish, meat and cocoa by the kilo; great quantities of maize and wheat, but all stale, rotten, mossy. Nancy: Next to the city court 26 magistrates lynched together and, to boot, a “rag” annihilated for being pro-government and supporting the corrupt administration. Throughout, every hangar, warehouse or shop attacked.]

This is the beginning of the English version by Gilbert Adair: Today, by radio, and also on giant hoardings, a rabbi, an admiral notorious for his links to Masonry, a trio of cardinals, a trio, too, of insignificant politicians (bought and paid for by a rich Anglo-Canadian banking corporation), inform us all of how our country now risks of dying by starvation. A rumour, that’s my initial thought as I switch off my radio, a rumour or possibly a hoax. Propaganda, I murmur anxiously -as though just by saying so, I might allay my doubts- typical politicians’ propaganda, but public opinion gradually absorbs it as a fact. Individuals start strutting around with stout clubs. ‘Food, glorious food!’ is a common cry (occasionally sung to Bart’s music), with ordinary hard-working folk harassing officials, both local and national, and cursing capitalists and captains of industry. Cops shrink from going out on night shift. In Macon a mob storms a municipal building. In Rocamadour ruffians rob a hangar full of foodstuffs, pillaging tons of tuna fish, milk and cocoa, as also a vast quantity of corn - all of it, alas, totally unfit for human consumption. Without fuss or ado, and naturally without any sort of trial, an indignant crowd hangs 26 solicitors on a hastily build scaffold in front of Nancy’s law courts (this Nancy is a town, not a woman) and ransacks a local journal, a disgusting right-wing rag that is siding up against it. Up and down this land of ours looting has brought docks, shops and farms to a virtual standstill.

As we can appreciate, the translator has taken more than a few liberties, not all of them justified, explainable or successful. Of course, out of context, the first thing to come to the English reader’s mind when he arrives at the grapheme Nancy is the name of a woman, not the homonymous French city; but if the reader knows that the action is taking place in France, the clarification is somewhat jarring, since it strongly activates an extremely weak implicature that the reader may have never even thought of. In this and other passages an unnecessary (i.e. arbitrary) lack of LPIo/LPCi identity is allowed. In this sense, we can speak, if not of translation mistakes, certainly of unjustifiable deviations from translation - i.e. of unjustifiably active, or, even, hyperactive mediation. This would be a typical case of mediation “mistake”: by arbitrarily manipulating LPIo into LPIi -in order, I presume, to show off- the translator prevents relevant LPIo/LPCi identity. If my guess is correct, then, as a literary translation critic, I am taking issue with the translator’s own motivation and intention, with the skopos he has chosen: There is no justification, to my mind, for such active meddling with the original beyond what is strictly necessary in order to make me understand Perec’s direct intended sense by means of an analogously marked Fi, so as to allow me to metarepresent as smoothly or laboriously as a 388

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reader of the original equipped with a relevantly similar hermeneutic package the author’s indirect intended sense and, thereby, experiencing the relevant qualitative effects. This by no means minor consideration aside, let us examine how aptly the translator manages to reverbalise the LPIo without betraying the formal intention by means of an Fi that admirably conceals the many turns that he takes in order to avoid that blasted letter e. The trick, as all tricks in life, is strictly perceptual: as the author before him the translator must manage to cheat the reader into not perceiving the linguistic contortions that are the price of abiding by the chosen constraint. As with all art, it must seem (i.e. perceived as) easy, natural, almost unavoidable. In this respect, I find the translation admirable. The instances of excessive manipulation are easily solvable: all this particular translator needs -and deserves- is a slap on the wrist. Would that one could be as lenient with most! In the case of Oneguin, Nabokov could invoke the absolute supremacy of semantic form and, up to a point, get away with it. In this case, however, a translator invoking the same alibi would fail miserably: in order to be homofunctional, the translation of a detective novel must pose an enigma as difficult as the original’s. If the intended reader of an owner’s manual wishes to be informed, the intended reader of a thriller wishes to be thrilled; and if, because his acumen or his language prevents him, the translator cannot manage to thrill him, it is simply better not to translate - it would be a senseless act, an act with no relevant skopos. What cannot be perceived when uprooted from its situation or its form cannot, by definition, be “translated” - because to translate is to speak, and to speak is to produce percepts. This is what García Landa’s revolutionary theory explains and, with it, the possibility, limitations and impossibility of translation. This is, finally, the explanation of what Ortega y Gasset calls the misery and splendour of translation. A “translation” of Perec’s novel will or won’t be, from this standpoint, a “translation.” The way in which the aesthetic intention (i.e. the will to produce certain qualitative effects by adopting strict formal limitations) determines the very configuration of an LPIo and forces an author to dodge a letter is decisive. Without that (or perhaps an analogous) constraint, the novel loses much of its purpose. If the purpose of the translator is to produce, say, in Spanish, an analogous DTi, the LPIo will be more of a reference point - a guide of sorts from which the translator will strive to depart as little as possible rather than reproduce it in all its noetic details. Reproducing it in all its details, moreover, would be both simply impossible and simply wrong, since often the original LPIo itself has been “distorted” by Fo constraints, as the above passage clearly shows. In any event, a translation that would not impose upon itself an analogous restraint does not make much sense as a representation of Perec’s novel. Because literary functionality lies, always, in indirect intended sense, and in this case the basic clue lies, precisely, in the absence of the letter e. The poetic licenses that both author and translator must take, are but a compromise

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between LPI and F, a compromise that can fall either way: Semantic or syntactic form may be compromised in order to preserve phonic form (as in the case of La disparition), or the latter may be compromised in order to accommodate semantic content (the most glaring case in point being all the conventional “rhymes” for love in English, which, except for dove, above, shove and a few others, do not rhyme at all - and that is how English poetry has “survived” this appalling black hole). We already knew that form, whenever the effectiveness of communication depends on it, will corner us between a rock and a hard place. Still, the answer does not change: To translate is to speak in one language in order to say what has been said in another, and translation -as communication itself- succeeds insofar as it allows for identity between two percepts of the same social object, of the same speech perceptual space, of the same LP - i.e. of intended sense. The great debate is whether such identity is enough or whether and up to what point the cognitive and qualitative effects of comprehension must also be accommodated, even at the expense of LPIo/LPCi identity. The history of translation practice and, in its wake, translation theory is but that of the diverse, mostly intuitive approximations to this crucial phenomenon that, as far as I am aware, had hitherto been un-baptised: relevant identity between intended sense as perceived by the speaker and as comprehended by the addressee in a specific social situation, or, more laconically: (LPIo[=]LPCi). Servitude to “the word” (i.e. to semantic form) and despise for prosodic form in some cases, or, in others, “domestication” of referential content and adaptation of form to the prevailing tastes of a specific readership, have been but facets of the different concepts -often intuitive, a-critical or haphazard- of this relevant identity. Reading, with its hiatus in physical, social or individual time and space vis-à-vis writing, makes things more difficult. All that translation does is, on the one hand, duplicate this cleavage while, on the other, reverbalise an LPIo by means of different semiotic material with different possibilities and limitations, for different readers, in a series of different situations. A double difficulty, then, that requires a double effort. If great translations are less rife than great originals it is due to the fact that producing a great translation of a great original is, statistically speaking, more difficult: for each great poet there should be, at least every ten generations or so, as many great translator/poets as there are written languages. Impossible. That is why the miracle of a translation that truly does honour to a great original seems so miraculous. Yet, like the appearances of Halley’s comet every eighty years or so, it is actually not, as Nabokov has so unexpectedly -if not surprisingly- proven to us. Unlike an author who writes what he wishes about what he knows for people he knows, a literary translator is often faced with a translatologically unsolvable problem: no matter how much effort both he and his readers may make, the latter cannot perceive the weaker implicatures and proceed to the same series of semioses that the reader of the 390

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original has, for all practical purposes, served on a platter. The solution lies always in abandoning the chimera of an “absolute” translation and think and act in terms of relevant identity. One must first decide to what extent a specific implicature is crucial for the relevant comprehension of an LPI. Understanding speech and, therefore, translation as the production of percepts helps us understand where lies, for instance, the impossibility of conveying social and geographical lects. There are, of course, ways of indicating social or geographic origin, but in many cases they cannot be conveyed metalinguistically. Neither can be linguistically conveyed in translation via grammatical distinctions (such as the different first persons singular of Russian, Spanish or German) that a target language (for instance English) cannot make. How does an English translation show the evolution of the relationship between the two men who in the Spanish narrative begin by addressing each other as “Ud.” and then at one point start addressing each other as “tú”? The physician and the nurse that meet at Heathrow airport and end up spending the night together in Paris, in what page of the Spanish translation will suddenly switch from “Ud.” to “tú”? In a Spanish translation of this example, what sex are the physician and the nurse above? Ultimately, as a function of linguistic similarities and coincidences between the hermeneutic packages of the readers of the original and those of the translation, a higher or lesser degree of semantic isonymy will invariably be achieved between different verbalisations of a specific LPI in different languages. In the Oneguin strophes that we have analysed, such isonymy appears most clearly; less so in the sonnet by Shakespeare. The important thing to remember, then, is that isonymy is but a symptom, a Peircean index of identity pursued, not its condition. Anisomorphy between language(s) and thought is a fact that, while making translation more difficult, makes it also possible. That’s dialectics for you! Now that we know what we are talking about when we speak about translation -about all the translation we know of or can foresee- we can safely embark upon the most diverging paths: its history, the cognitive processes it involves, its pedagogy, its censorship, the translator’s social role, his visibility or invisibility, and even, if manipulationists still insist, pseudotranslations. Now. Hitherto, I submit, it was somewhat premature. Conclusion I have striven to account for the most disparate aspects of practice applying each time the model I am suggesting. In all cases we have seen how what behoves an interlingual mediator is always the same: first to determine and then to achieve maximum possible relevant identity between sense as originally meant by the speaker -who has verbalised it in the source language configuring it paralinguistically and kinetically (or typographically and graphically)- and as finally understood by the interlocutor who processes the mediator’s analogously configured verbalisation in the target language.

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What counts in each case as relevant identity depends solely on the metacommunicative purposes and hermenutic and heuristic ability of the parties to the double speech act and is determined by the mediator (be it on his own, or in consultation with the parties, or saddled with a specific brief) - even if some believe it is not so. They fool themselves: obedience -even the blindest or dumbest, the most timorous or selfless- is but one of freedom’s guises. The first thing to be weighted when it comes to judge a mediator or a specific act of mediation is, thus, how aptly relevant identity has been identified. Only then does it make sense to go about assessing the specific hermeneutic and heuristic moves. Since such relevant identity is never exactly the same for the different parties, the mediator, as a function of the metacommunicative purposes and consequences of his mediation and on the basis of his loyalty, decides what criteria to follow. The most important corollary is that the mediator is interested in the relationship between “texts” and “utterances” only instrumentally. His actual concern is the relationship between sense as intended and as understood - and, more specifically, what the interlocutors achieve by means of those “texts” and “utterances” as produced and understood by specific people in specific situations. The second most important corollary is that there is no necessary relationship between original and translated texts - which explains the exasperating conceptual and practical elusiveness of textual “equivalence”. Such formal (semantic or other) equivalence, similarity, resemblance or coincidence between the formal attributes of original and translation is but one (if the most frequent and apparent) consequence of the mediator’s quest for relevant identity between mental representations. This insight, I submit, throws new light on the dictum that a translator does not find equivalences, but creates them. Not quite: a translator finds textual ways of achieving relevant identity between meaning as intended and as understood; these ways may or may not coincide totally, partially or at all with the ways resorted to by the original speaker in his original text. When they do, then some kind of textual “equivalence” will certainly be found. Since very often they do not, it is not altogether productive to look for shared textual attributes as if texts were artefacts in a vacuum. There is, therefore, no need to discard the concept or the term - all that is required is to be aware that it is an ancillary, incidental (if statistically rife) phenomenon that may be present or absent. So the relationship between the mediator’s text or utterance and the original may be extremely varied. We can call it, indeed, “coherence”, as the skopostheorists do, but I do not think it is clear enough. Such relationship is better defined, I think, as adequacy: The text or utterance, or segment thereof, is adequate if and only if its comprehension by an interlocutor (whether intended or not) allows it to be relevantly identical to sense as originally intended. Since such identity is always ad hoc and a function of the parties’ motivations, resistance, sensitivity and heuristic and hermeneutic ability (coupled to all 392

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situational factors and the systems gravitating upon them), even though the notion itself does not change, its practical realisation is always different… a bit like happiness. Such adequacy, moreover, is a matter of degree: speech acts initiated by a mediator in a specific situation can be more adequate or less - the more adequate, the better his mediation. An interlingual mediator’s specific job, I insist, is no longer to understand directly or indirectly intended sense, or deep meaning (any “professional” interlocutor - critic, detective, psychoanalyst, scholar) has such a task. Nor is it to reverbalise sense in another language (for that, all that is needed is a “translator”). Nor is it to achieve, as is the case with monolingual mediators (lawyers, ambassadors, amicable brokers), relevant identity between sense intended and understood. Of course, the interlingual mediator has to do all those things as well, but his specific job is to achieve such identity by initiating a new act of speech in a different language (or dialect). The skopos of an act of mediation is, therefore, invariably the same: to determine and achieve the highest degree of relevant identity between intended and comprehended sense in a specific situation. Or, put in other terms, to have the interlocutor understand what, in the mediator’s professional judgement and insofar as objectively possible and deontologically acceptable, its is metacommunicatively necessary, convenient or advisable that he understand in the way that it is necessary, convenient or advisable that he understand it. In the practice of his profession, the interlingual mediator often stumbles against his lack of social power, due both to his clients’ mistrust and to his own theoretical insecurity. These limitations -typical of a young profession that has not yet succeeded in establishing itself and lacks an underlying generally known, acknowledged, assimilated, aptly applied theory- impede his exercising his deontologically responsible freedom. Our great battle is to overcome these two interdependent hurdles. It is too late for practitioners of my generation, I’m afraid: It is now up to our professional offspring to carry the day, but they too will find it impossible unless they are solidly equipped with an apt theoretical outlook. This is why students must be taught to mediate and not simply to “translate” or to “interpret.” This requires that they be endowed with the necessary theoretical wherewithal for competent practice, beginning with an analysis of the metacommunicative framework, the circumstances in which speech is produced and understood, and what comprehension is all about - and not only of speech, but, above all, of the speaker’s intentions from the standpoint of one’s own interests and resistance. A thorough analysis of comprehension as metarepresentation is, I submit indispensable. These elements must be in their young hands before anything else. A scientific theory of interlingual mediation cannot come as an afterthought. One cannot be taught first to swim and then to float. Hence my obdurate emphasis on didactics. Hence the flood of examples.

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I thank you for your benign patience, my unknown reader. I hope I have managed to be mostly relevant and also to convince you. Now it is time for me to take my leave: my mental throat is sore and my physical fingers numb. You go and fix yourself a drink too, my friend. You really deserve it.

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d) Italian Eugenio Onegin, introduzione e traduzione di Eridano Bazzarelli, Rizzoli, Milano, 1996. Evgenij Onegin, a cura di Pia Pera, Marsilio, Venezia, 1996. Evgénij Onégin, a cura di Ettore Lo Gatto, Ugo Mursia - Editore, Milano, 1972. Eugenio Onieghin da Puskin in versi italiani, traduzione di Giovanni Giudici, Grazanti, Milano, 1999. e) Spanish Antología lírica, traducción, estudio preliminar y notas de Eduardo Alonso Luengo, Poesía Hiperión, Madrid, 1999. Eugenio Onieguin, traducción de Nina y Anatole Saderman, Corregidor, Buenos Aires, 1977. Eugenio Onieguin, traducción y notas de Irene Tchernova, Aguilar, Madrid, 1962. Eugenio Onieguin, edición a cargo de Doñ Teresa Suero Roca, Licenciada en Letras, Editorial Bruguera, S.A., Barcelona, 1969. Eugenio Onieguin, versión castellana de Alexis Markoff, Plaza y James, S.A., Barcelona, 1962. Eugenio Onieguin, Revista Literaria, Domingo 17.10.1954, año XXVI:1223. Eugenio Oneguin, edición bilingüe de Mijaíl Chílikov, Cátedra, Madrid, 2000.

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THE SYMBOLS AND THEIR DEFINITIONS D o i Z W Y Y U A a LP LPI LPC K F X L S H V R J Q G P M VH t m/n = [=] >

→ ↔ [→ ]

Speech act (V = oral, T = written, I = inner) Original language Target language Unconscious motivation or resistance to speak or to understand Conscious motivation or resistance to speak Main pragmatic intention Secondary pragmatic intentions Conscious predisposition or resistance to understand Main contextual effect of comprehension (cognitive and qualitative or emotive) Secondary contextual effects of comprehension (cognitive or qualitative or emotive) Speech percept, an “amalgam” of noetic or propositional content and speech signs Intended speech percept (that which the speaker means to produce on his interlocutor) – intended meaning Comprehended speech percept (that which the speaker ends up producing) – comprehended meaning Encyclopaedic knowledge base as activated in order to speak or understand (precomprehension schemes or passing theories) Linguistic sign chain (the actual utterance or text) (phono)morphosyntactic structure (phono)morphosyntactic system Semantic potential Semantic structure Rhythmic/prosodic structure Rhythmic/prosodic system Register Register series Socio-historical field System of shared beliefs, norms and practices or life and personal experience (culture) Relevant microworld Historic moment Specific time Specific features Perceptual identity between meaning meant and comprehended Similarity or equivalence of formal features Relevant identity between meaning meant and comprehended determination Mono-directional production Bi-directional production Transformation between meaning as understood by the mediator and meaning as intended by the mediator

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