Magin_Edward-thesis

37
Can it be said that the possibilities for re-creation rather than retention are
more restricted in this sphere than in the linguistic and the literary,
whereas in the other two spheres the pressures against retentive
historicizing are greater? And have these possibilities and pressures varied
from age to age and from country to country? (Holmes 1988:42)
While he realizes he has only conducted “a preliminary study,” Holmes (1988:41-42)
does note that other studies of translations from older poetry have resulted in similar
findings.
Holmes continues the discussion by showing how metapoets over the centuries
have employed different strategies for producing a metapoem. For example, in the
nineteenth century metapoets were given to “exoticizing 20 and historicizing on all planes”
(Holmes 1988:49). What is most noteworthy in this discussion is Holmes’ summary of
the translator’s conundrum: How can something of quality be produced amid these two
juxtaposed positions―to faithfully translate while at the same time write a poem? His
discussion is repeated below.
Translation, like many other goal-oriented activities, lends itself to
consideration in the light of the theory of games. Viewed from this
vantage point, the translation of a text consists of a game set by the
translator: the game of producing an acceptable translation…The two
basic rules of the game of verse translation are that the final result (1) must
match the original to a large enough degree that it will be considered a
translation (the criterion of minimum matching or minimum fit), and (2)
must be of such a nature that it will be considered a poem (the poetic
criterion).
The poetic criterion entails a demand of unity or homogeneity: a poem,
whatever else it may be, can be defined as a coherent textual whole. Yet
the fact of translation, by its very nature, entails a basic dichotomy
between source and target languages, literatures, and cultures―a
dichotomy with, moreover, a temporal as well as a spatial dimension. To
harmonize the demand of unity and the fact of dichotomy, the translator
must resort to a game strategy of illusionism: accepting the dichotomy as
inevitable, he must map out a general strategy of selecting from his
retentive and re-creative possibilities those which will induce the illusion
of unity. At the outset there are few further restrictions. But as the
20 “Exoticizing” as opposed to “naturalizing.”