FROM TRANSLATION, NO ONE ESCAPES Presentation of the Journal Doletiana «Philosophy and Translation» Nº 4, 2012-2013 Xavier Bassas Vila University of Barcelona bassas@ub.edu We dedicate the fourth issue of the journal Doletiana to the theme "Philosophy and Translation". Whether this subject is actually what is called a proper "theme" - interest in which has varied enormously throughout history - or more fundamentally a practical relation" between two acts of thought incapable of conversion into one theme, is a question that we will find analyzed in all the texts, especially in the Spanish translation of a chapter of Antoine Berman presented at the end of this issue. Accordingly, the texts included here reflect different perspectives on the theoretical and practical importance of philosophy with respect to translation, of translation with respect to philosophy, as well as on their relationship in light of the numerous forms that this relationship can take. In this context, we note from the outset that most of the texts presented here take philosophy as a starting point to move towards translation as the point of arrival and object of study. They are texts, therefore, which examine, "the philosophy of translation, that is, conceptual questions that the interlinguistic passage has raised in the history of philosophy and theoretical openings and expansions of its scope proposed by thinkers and translation theorists. This first set of texts includes, therefore, reflections on translation closely linked to philosophical questions or to authors who have developed a theory of translation. Despite the myriad of details that that distinguish them in their theoretical and stylistic peculiarities, we can discern two main approaches. On the one hand, in the texts of the celebrated Michel Deguy and of Xavier Bassas we can read reflections on translation that take as fundamental theoretical framework the history of philosophy, more precisely understood as the history of metaphysics. In poetical writing that is, in
itself, both a theoretical approach and philosophical practice, the text by Michel Deguy takes as point of departure a claim by Tsvetaeva about the possibility or impossibility of translating Pushkin and proceeds to develop a non- metaphysical theory of translation as an act of translation. Deguy assumes, in fact, that we cannot approach translation without positioning ourselves inside or outside a certain metaphysical conception of language as expression, where "what is said" is a substance and the subject an interiority. In his non-metaphysical perspective, Deguy then develops his reflection through cultural and grammatical analyses, and concludes with an opposition between two worlds and modes in translation: Les finalités [de l un et l autre «monde» de la traduction] sont opposées : dans un cas, le plus fréquenté, il s agit de neutraliser Babel, d abolir la diversité des langues, qui fait que les humains ne s entendent pas. Dans l autre, c est l inverse : le champ est la littérature ; chaque langue est appelée par le trésor de son chef-d œuvre (de Shakespeare ; de Molière ; de Dante ; de Goethe ; de Pouchkine ; de Cervantès, etc. ; ce sont leurs œuvres qui protègent les langues). Traduire ici veut dire «faire l épreuve de l Étranger» ; creuser la différence abyssale, dite de «l intraduisible», entre les langues des œuvres. Xavier Bassas builds the reflections of his text also on the basis of two modes/worlds in translation, and also on the history of metaphysics. His text effectively turns on the following question: "How is metaphysics to be translated". With the aim of understanding the unique translation exercises carried out by two great thinkers of French philosophy today, Jean-Luc Marion and Alain Badiou, the author takes the philosophical notions of "immanence" and "transcendence" in order to apply them to the field of translation. On the basis of these notions, we can certainly better understand the work carried out by J.L. Marion to translate Descartes by Descartes himself, as well as the translation-recreation of Plato's Republic by A. Badiou. The opposition between the translation work of Marion and that of Badiou leads the author of the article to finally propose a textual and conceptual distinction between "immanent translation" and "transcendental translation". In this fourth issue of the journal, Doletiana, we find a second approach that runs through all these texts, appearing very clearly in the articles by Carla Canullo and Daniel Barreto. On the basis of a conception of translation as an "act of hospitality", these texts develop the same "ethical paradigm" of the act of translating along paths which are, however, quite different. Canullo traces her own journey through the thought of many theorists of translation and translators Berman, Ricoeur and Pareyson, among others DOLETIANA 4 PHILOSOPHY AND TRANSLATION 2
in order to thus bring together the notions of hospitality, metaphor and truth to be interpreted". The author notes in this regard that passer d une langue à l autre, d un texte à l autre, d une culture à l autre est un geste où se traduit une vérité des textes et des cultures dont la dimension interprétative n est pas accidentelle. The movement of translation activates, therefore, one truth of the languages and cultures intrinsically linked to interpretation. On the other hand, Daniel Barreto focuses his reflections on the thought of Franz Rosenzweig in order to first establish a fundamental opposition between simple translation of "what is said" and translation as a creative activity of the language. This opposition also appears in another form in the text already discussed by Michel Deguy included in this issue, which allows an intertextual reading to this collection through the links which the texts themselves create. In a clear and sober style, Barreto slowly traces the opposition of Rosenzweig in order to examine universality as a key notion of a non-homogenizing relation between people/cultures. In this regard, the text of the Bible and its various translations beginning with the first Greek version - offer us a privileged experience and manifestation. Directly linked with these questions, the text by Salah Basalamah relies on "Cultural Translation" to expand the possibilities of a "philosophy of translation" properly speaking. Based on two texts of P. Ricoeur, as well as those of Ladmiral among others, the author proposes to set out along a path that leads translation towards the social sciences. In this direction, post-colonial studies right away offer an expansion of the act of translating which includes the linguistic, cultural and geographical domains. However, a philosophy of translation should be extended further and also be able to think the transformation of human beings in a more global and comprehensive manner to include the psychological dimension as well, and even the spiritual". Translation, in a spiritual and ethical paradigm, thus crosses the boundaries that confine it as a discipline (academic) and thus opens it to all areas of life. *** Research into what we call, conversely, the translation of philosophy " is not very much represented in this issue despite the fundamental interest that this perspective means for us today. Yes indeed, it seems to us necessary to insist on the importance of language and writing in philosophy, a discipline subject to the domination of the concept and which often forgets DOLETIANA 4 PHILOSOPHY AND TRANSLATION 3
that without a text there is nothing that we understand by philosophy. In this respect, highlighting the translations of philosophical texts and developing critical analyses of the translations themselves are two exercises that can indeed help us to insist on this forgotten textual fact. The work that these critical analyses carry out on the texts themselves, as well as the rigorous study of the different levels that compose them (not only the conceptual and semantic level, but the stylistic, rhetorical etc. level as well )are an essential tool to remember the textuality of philosophy. Philosophy is also made of language, of a syntax that reveals a style of writing, an attimes untranslatable lexicon (logos, Dasein, différance, etc.., see - Vocabulaire Europeén des Philosophes. Dictionnaire des intraduisibles, edited by Barbara Cassin, the best current reference on this subject), and the analysis of translations becomes a good phenomenalizing principle of these questions. This very approach is adopted in his text by Francisco Martín Díez, who analyses the Spanish translations of the book by Paul Ricoeur entitled Temps et récit. The author thus makes a study of a philosophical translation in order to uncover the linguistic and conceptual implications of different decisions taken by the translator of Ricœur s work. Díez focuses especially on two fundamental notions in the Riœur text: the "mise en intrigue" and the binomial "avant/amont", which allow him to reflect on the relationship between translation and interpretation, translation studies and hermeneutics in the light of Gadamer s theory. Given the few texts received that follow this line of study, I simply note a lack of interest shown in this "critique of translations" at the present moment. In the literary field, however, it is a little more developed. The introduction to La Traduction et la lettre ou l Auberge du lointain (1985), by Antoine Berman, also devotes some fragments to this critique of translations, thus concluding the fourth issue of the journal Doletiana. Thanks to the excellent Spanish translation made by Núria d Asprer, this text demonstrates its full potential and the reasons why it has constituted and continues to constitute an essential and enriching reference not only for translation studies and for all those people who translate. Notions such as "word-for-word translation ", servile translation", "literal translation and translation to the letter", together with the binomial theory / practice of translation versus experience / reflection form the conceptual universe in which the famous Antoine Berman develops a theory of translation that goes beyond an academic discipline and practice where some wish to confine the act of translation: DOLETIANA 4 PHILOSOPHY AND TRANSLATION 4
Aussi la traductologie n enseigne pas la traduction, mais développe de manière transmissible (conceptuelle) l expérience qu est la traduction dans son essence plurielle. Le parallèle, ici, avec la psychanalyse, le théâtre ou la philosophie ne saurait être assez souligné. Connecting in this way translation studies to the fundamental disciplines for the constitution of our most intimate subjectivity, Berman finally writes in this respect: À ce titre, la traductologie ne concerne pas les seuls traducteurs, mais tous ceux qui sont pris dans l espace de la traduction. C est-à-dire nous tous, en tant que, de la traduction, nul n est libre. So, in a nutshell: "... from translation, no one escapes. *** I would like to finish this presentation by thanking the promoters of the journal Doletiana, Ramon Lladó and especially Núria d Asprer, the director, for their invitation to edit this issue, as well as for her constant and patient help so that these texts could be published here. I must also thank the authors of the texts for their essential contribution, because the effort to further research on translation, language and our existence is as necessary today as it ever was. Because from translation, in fact, no one escapes. Neither yesterday, nor today, nor tomorrow. Translator : Eamon Butterfield DOLETIANA 4 PHILOSOPHY AND TRANSLATION 5