Literature: Round Table
Translating Japanese Literature: The Next Generation
Chair: Anthony H. Chambers, anthony.chambers@asu.edu, Arizona State University
Round table participants:
Philip Gabriel, jgabriel@u.arizona.edu, University of Arizona
Van C. Gessel, van_gessel@byu.edu, Brigham Young University
Charles Inouye, cinouye@emerald.tufts.edu, Tufts University
Stephen Snyder, stephen.snyder@colorado.edu, University of Colorado
Eve Zimmerman, ezimmerm@wellesley.edu, Wellesley College
In 1998 the International House of Japan convened a colloquium, organized by Donald Richie, on translating modern Japanese fiction into English. The resulting book, WORDS, IDEAS, AND AMBIGUITIES: FOUR PERSPECTIVES ON TRANSLATING FROM THE JAPANESE, includes presentations by Edwin McClellan, Edward Seidensticker , Howard Hibbett, and John Nathan, and an extensive discussion. These presenters are distinguished, veteran translators, well established and, in three cases, retired.
The roundtable proposed here will afford translators of a younger generation the opportunity to address some of the issues raised by the Tokyo colloquium and to raise new issues. Just as each generation needs its own translations, each generation needs its own translators, and each generation of translators views its tasks a little differently than its predecessors and mentors did. Audiences change, as well, as knowledge of Japanese culture becomes more common among the reading public. The increasing prominence of theory in recent studies of Japanese literature has also influenced translators. The roundtable format will allow for a free, animated discussion of literary translation from Japanese to English from the point of view of some of the most distinguished younger translators active today.
Some of the issues likely to be discussed are: why we translate; the process of translation; the advantages and disadvantages of teaching translated texts; the tension between "naturalizing" a Japanese text for readers of English, and retaining important Japanese qualities; the audience for translations of Japanese fiction; the criteria that determine what gets translated and published; the relationship between translation theory and the practice of translation ; the relationship between translation and criticism; the relationship between the translator and the editor; translating living authors versus deceased authors; gender issues; and re-translation. The discussion will be informed also by essays by Edward Fowler and others on translating Japanese literature.