The other author of 'Don Quixote'

Translating literature should count as an art, says Edith Grossman

By Peter Terzian | March 7, 2010

When we read Tolstoy’s works in English translation - or those of Kafka, de Beauvoir, Sebald, or any other foreign author - what exactly are we reading? We may be reading a great writer’s sense, but not his or her actual words. It’s easy to forget that a translated book has been, in essence, rewritten by someone else.

Translation gives one culture access to another; it lets ideas flow across language barriers. The magical-realist worlds of Columbian writer Gabriel García Márquez, for instance, might not have been possible without his childhood reading of William Faulkner, translated into Spanish. A nation whose artistic life is confined by its borders is a diminished one.

Even so, the accomplishments of translators are rarely given their due. Rather than view them as literary stylists in their own right, we regard translators as shadows of the original authors. How many readers of foreign literature pay close attention to the name printed below the author’s, usually in small type?

In her forthcoming book, “Why Translation Matters,” Edith Grossman, the celebrated Spanish-language translator of “Don Quixote” and works by García Márquez and Mario Vargas Llosa, argues that a literary translation is a unique artistic artifact, and should be evaluated and respected separately from the original text. Grossman’s book, which will be published this month by Yale University Press, is a passionate defense of the translator’s art, as well as a swift rap on the knuckles of American publishers for their reluctance to take on translations of foreign works, depriving readers of new voices and new information.

Grossman spoke to Ideas by telephone from her home in Manhattan.

IDEAS: In your new book, you argue that a translation is an independent work of art, the product of the translator and not the original author. Why?

GROSSMAN: Languages are different systems. They have different vocabularies; they have different histories. [And] although the inspiration for a translation into English comes from someplace else - the original text - the creation of it is the work of the translator. That makes it a separate entity, and that certainly helps to account for why translations of the same text are different - because different translators bring different sensibilities to the work. Translations are not made with tracing paper. There is an interpretive act that goes on, and if you have 10 different ways of saying something - which isn’t an unusual occurrence - the choice of which of those 10 ways you use in the translation affects the tenor and tone of the work.

IDEAS: Of those 10 ways, you try to pick the one that captures the original author’s sense...

GROSSMAN: Yes, and the way that makes most sense in English. Cognates are not necessarily always the best translation. For example, in a Romance language like Spanish, Latin-based words are very common, much more frequent than in English. In English they tend to belong to a very elevated diction, while in the Romance languages they’re ordinary, everyday words. Some alternative way of expressing that concept has to be found in English, otherwise the English sounds stilted.

IDEAS: What do you think of the following quote from the Austrian writer Thomas Bernhard, who said, “[T]ranslation is impossible. A piece of music is played the same the world over, using the written notes...”

GROSSMAN: That is nonsense!

IDEAS: “… but a book would always have to be played in German, in my case. With my orchestra!”

GROSSMAN: I understand what he’s saying. But interpreters of music vary. Not every string quartet plays Beethoven in exactly the same way. The Emerson is different from the Juilliard. In a sense, translation is a performance, just as a musician performing someone else’s music, or an actor speaking someone else’s lines, is also engaged in performance. It’s an old idea. The Italians said it - “traddure e tradire,’’ or “translation is treason.” Even Cervantes, who plays with translation all the way through “Don Quixote,” says reading a translation is like looking at a tapestry from the wrong side. You get a rough idea of what the subject of the tapestry is, but you don’t see the actual artfulness of it.

IDEAS: Do you read much work by other translators?

GROSSMAN: When I’m working I prefer to read contemporary American and English fiction. It gives me an idea of what’s possible. Aside from the fact that I’m addicted to novels, reading great fiction broadens my own repertoire of responses to a text. Gregory Rabassa said that when he was working on “One Hundred Years of Solitude,” some ninny asked him if he knew enough Spanish to translate it, and his answer was that the real question was whether or not he knew enough English. He hit it right on the head.

IDEAS: As you translate a book into a different language, how do you separate your own voice from the author’s?

GROSSMAN: It’s difficult, but that’s part of the trick of translating - to be able to leave your ear neutral enough so you can hear the first language, and know your own language well enough so you can echo it.

IDEAS: When you talk to other translators, what issues are on their minds?

GROSSMAN: I know the translation committee of PEN is working very hard on creating model contracts and guidelines for translators as they negotiate with publishers, most of whom are representatives of vast multinational corporations. The committee is also concerned with making an effort to monitor reviews, and write notes to editors who omit the name of the translator, for example, which does happen in certain publications. It’s dealing with very real and practical issues that affect a translator’s work.

IDEAS: If you were to write your own prescription for the publishing industry, what would it be?

GROSSMAN: Otis Redding and Aretha Franklin have a song called “R-E-S-P-E-C-T.” Bring a little respect to the dealings with translators. That has to do not only with recognizing translators as artists and writers in their own right but with not paying them peon’s wages, not arguing about giving them credit on the jacket, with citing their names in advertisements and so forth.

IDEAS: You’re critical of book reviewers who review a translation but only nod to the translator’s work with words like “ably.” Can a reviewer who is not familiar with the language of the original text fairly review a translation?

GROSSMAN: I just saw a review where somebody quarreled with the translation of the title because the translator decided to leave out “and” and used commas instead. And they’re interchangeable, really. We really are lacking in an adequate vocabulary for discussing translation intelligently.

IDEAS: Let’s say a reviewer or a reader is trying to choose between two translations of a book. How can he or she best judge which one is better?

GROSSMAN: In a way it’s like asking, how do you choose between two pianists who perform a Beethoven sonata? Well, maybe you listen to both. The fact that you like one doesn’t mean the other is inadequate. In the case of a book that’s been translated more than once, if you have several translations, how terrific for you. That means you have a very, very broad range of interpretation.

Peter Terzian is the editor of the anthology ”Heavy Rotation: Twenty Writers on the Albums That Changed Their Lives.”