últimas corrientes teóricas en los estudios de traducción - Gredos ...

JOÃO FERREIRA DUARTE–REPRESENTING TRANSLATION IN THE COLONIAL ENCOUNTER
mediating task imposed on him 9 , the translator, on the other hand, ran the risk of facing a
death sentence if he did not perform his mediating task in compliance with the dominant
norms. And in case this sounds too vague, think of the fate of William Tyndale and
Etienne Dolet, among others.
To sum up, it seems to me theoretically, as well as analytically, plausible to argue for
an allegorical scope of Caminha’s “Letter”, highlighted by means of a reading strategy
rather than fully present in intentional meaning: the plight of the degredados is made to
represent the invisibility of the contemporary translators. And if I were willing to strain my
analogies beyond propriety, I would conclude that, judging from the author’s obvious relish
in looking at and describing the native women’s bodies, as well as his recurring call for
Christianisation of those heathens, here is an instance, not of les belles infidèles, to be sure,
but of “les infidèles belles”.
WORKS CITED
ASAD, Talal. “The Concept of Cultural Translation in British Social Anthropology”. In
CLIFFORD, James; MARCUS, George E. (eds.) Writing Culture: The Poetics and Politics of
Ethnography. Berkeley, Los Angeles & London: University of California Press, 1986,
pp. 141-64.
BUENO, Eduardo. Náufragos, Traficantes e Degredados: As Primeiras Expedições ao Brazil, 1500-
1531. Rio de Janeiro: Objetiva, 1968
Carta de el-rei D. Manuel ao rei catholico narrando-lhe as viagens portuguezas à India desde 1500 até
1505. Trans.: Pospero Peragallo, Lisboa: Typ. da Academia Real das Sciencias,
1892.
CHEYFITZ, Eric. The Poetics of Imperialism: Translation and Colonization from “The Tempest” to
“Tarzan”. New York & Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1991.
COATES, Timothy Joel. Exiles and Orphans: Forced and State-Sponsored Colonizers in the Portuguese
Empire, 1550-1720. Unpublished doctoral dissertation University of Minnesota,
1993.
CORTESÃO, Jaime (ed.) A “Carta” de Pêro Vaz de Caminha. Lisboa: Imprensa Nacional-Casa
da Moeda, 1994 [1st edition 1943].
COUTO, Jorge. A construção do Brasil: ameríndios, portugueses e africanos do início do povoamento a
finais de Quinhentos. Lisboa: Cosmos, 1997 [1st edition 1995].
DA COSTA, A. Fontoura. Cartas das Ilhas de Cabo Verde de Valentim Fernandes, 1506-1508.
Agência Geral das Colónias: Lisboa, 1939.
9 “The fleet carried twenty convicts, or banished men, condemned to death. These were to be landed
at desirable places to proselyte the natives and to learn their language. Their success was to be rewarded with
pardon” (Greenlee 1938: 14n).
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