1st Edition

Theatre Translation in Performance

Edited By Silvia Bigliazzi, Paola Ambrosi, Peter Kofler Copyright 2013

    This volume focuses on the highly debated topic of theatrical translation, one brought on by a renewed interest in the idea of performance and translation as a cooperative effort on the part of the translator, the director, and the actors. Exploring the role and function of the translator as co-subject of the performance, it addresses current issues concerning the role of the translator for the stage, as opposed to the one for the editorial market, within a multifarious cultural context. The current debate has shown a growing tendency to downplay and challenge the notion of translational accuracy in favor of a recreational and post-dramatic attitude, underlying the role of the director and playwright instead. This book discusses the delicate balance between translating and directing from an intercultural, semiotic, aesthetic, and interlingual perspective, taking a critical stance on approaches that belittle translation for the theatre or equate it to an editorial practice focused on literality. Chapters emphasize the idea of dramatic translation as a particular and extremely challenging type of performance, while consistently exploring its various textual, intertextual, intertranslational, contextual, cultural, and intercultural facets. The notion of performance is applied to textual interpretation as performance, interlingual versus intersemiotic performance, and (inter)cultural performance in the adaptation of translated texts for the stage, providing a wide-ranging discussion from an international group of contributors, directors, and translators.

    Introduction 1. Transnational, Multilingual and Post-dramatic: Rethinking the Location of Translation in Contemporary Theatre Cristina Marinetti 2. Masks, Music Scores and Hourglasses: Rethinking Performability Through Metaphors Eva Espasa  3. Semantics and Syntax in Translating Shakespeare Alessandro Serpieri  4. Verse Translation for the Theatre: A Spanish Example Paola Ambrosi 5. Performing Intertextuality in Translating Rewrites Silvia Bigliazzi 6. From the Peninsula Westward: a Journey among Translations Lucia Nigri 7. Exploring a Bilingual Aesthetics through Translation in Performance Louise Ladouceur  8. Beckett, ‘Thou Art Translated’ Enoch Brater 9. The Pirandellian mis-en-scène and the Vanishing Translation Sharon Wood 10. Translator and Director: At Dagger's Drawn? Jean-Louis Besson 11. Dramatic Text/Literary Translation/Staging Guillermo Heras 12.Translating for the Audience: Plautus’ Captivi by Accademici Intronati (Siena 1530) and the Goldoni’s Adaptation of Voltaire’s L'écossaise (Venezia 1761) Marzia Pieri 13. ‘To act, to do, to perform’ Franz Heufeld’s and Friedrich Ludwig Schröder’s Hamlet- Adaptations for the German Stage Peter Kofler 14. "For the newer stage" and "For Our Contemporary Emotion." Suggestion and Emotion in Hofmannsthal’s Drama Translations Dieter Martin 15. Nogami Toyoichirō’s Noh Translation Theories and the Primacy of Performance Beverley Curran 16.Transforming Shakespeare into a Kabuki Piece for the Modern Audience: Ninagawa’s Twelfth Night Ayamu Oki-Siekierczak

     

    Biography

    Paola Ambrosi is Associate Professor of Spanish Literature at the University of Verona, Italy.

    Silvia Bigliazzi is Professor of English Literature at the University of Verona, Italy.

    Peter Kofler is Associate Professor of German Literature at the Department of Modern Languages, University of Verona, Italy.

    "What the essays share is a real sense of the location of the translation process, and in this respect each one offers illuminating analysis of the text as it is taken through the moves from one culture to another...Across form, approach, theory, geography and history this volume provides a series of responses to that challenge, and a welcome and authoritative contribution to the field of theatre translation studies." - Catherine Boyle, Studies in Theatre and Performance