{"id":2272,"date":"2020-01-28T08:46:47","date_gmt":"2020-01-28T07:46:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.eurotrad.com\/blog\/poetry-translation-problems-come-translating-poetry\/"},"modified":"2024-01-23T12:25:12","modified_gmt":"2024-01-23T11:25:12","slug":"poetry-translation-problems-come-translating-poetry","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.eurotrad.com\/en\/magazine\/poetry-translation-problems-come-translating-poetry\/","title":{"rendered":"The Problems That Come with Translating Poetry and How to Succeed"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The task of translating poetry has given rise to countless musings on\u00a0<strong>how best to translate poems into different languages\u00a0<\/strong>over the centuries. The ultimate goal of\u00a0<strong>poetry translators<\/strong>\u00a0is to convey the original poem\u2019s intent, meaning and style as faithfully as possible. Of course, this is an almost impossible task, and one that has resulted in some extremely different approaches, many of which have produced memorable and disastrous results in equal measure. But why is translating poems so difficult? And are some techniques better than others?<\/p>\n<h2>Who\u2019s best-placed to translate poetry?<\/h2>\n<p>Scholars and translators have long fought over the\u00a0<strong>task of translating poetry.\u00a0<\/strong>According to a rather ancient school of thought founded and developed in England during the Romantic period,\u00a0<strong>only poets should translate poetry.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Proponents of this approach once claimed that only poets are equipped with the cultural and technical skills required to fully understand the original text and create a good poetic translation.<\/p>\n<p>However true this may be, it happens all too often that a\u00a0<strong>poet-translator\u2019s own voice\u00a0<\/strong>\u00a0suffocates that of the original poet-author due to excessive modifications rooted in their own perceptions and poetic style. These individuals are sometimes referred to as<strong>\u00a0\u2018traitor translators.\u2019<\/strong><\/p>\n<h2>When non-poets translate poetry<\/h2>\n<p>These days, most modern poetry in translation is written by\u00a0<strong>professional translators\u00a0<\/strong>who are not professional poets. Translators tasked with this sort of work can opt for one of two approaches: a<strong>\u00a0service translation\u00a0<\/strong>or a\u00a0<strong>translation that remains faithful to the original.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>Service translations<\/strong>\u00a0are usually just<strong>\u00a0literal translations of the original poem<\/strong>\u00a0without any attempt to modify rhythm or style. These sorts of translations have very little to do with poetics and are best seen as literal poetry translations.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Translations<\/strong><strong>\u00a0that remain faithful to the original\u00a0<\/strong>try to find a<strong>\u00a0middle ground between a poetic translation and a literal translation.\u00a0<\/strong>The ultimate goal is to\u00a0<strong>approximately convey\u00a0<\/strong>the poem\u2019s literal and metaphorical meaning, along with its literary characteristics, such as verse length and rhyming structure.<\/p>\n<p>Translators who choose this approach are faced with certain limitations that poet-translators don\u2019t have to deal with. Translators specialised in poetic translations must try to keep their own impressions and experiences as far as possible from the translation by remaining entirely\u00a0<strong>neutral.\u00a0<\/strong>It\u2019s only by adopting this particular approach that\u00a0<strong>the original author\u2019s own voice and perspective can be heard.<\/strong><\/p>\n<h2>Poetry in translation: not just Shakespeare<\/h2>\n<p>When Italians think of poetry in translation, in all probability, they\u2019ll think of foreign poetry translated into Italian. A classic example is Shakespeare, who curiously relied on the expertise of a non-professional translator, Goffredo Raponi.<\/p>\n<p>Raponi originally trained in the legal field but was passionate about<strong>\u00a0English-to-Italian translations\u00a0<\/strong>and quickly became a point of reference for Shakespeare in Italian translation.<\/p>\n<p>What\u2019s more, Italian poetry translated into English is just as common as\u00a0<strong>English poetry\u00a0<\/strong>translated into Italian. As an example, the translation of\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.poetsofmodernity.xyz\/POMBR\/Italian\/Montale.php\">Eugenio Montale\u2019s works into English<\/a> can be found on a website entirely dedicated to his most famous poems.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The task of translating poetry has given rise to countless musings on\u00a0how best to translate poems into different languages\u00a0over the centuries. The ultimate goal of\u00a0poetry translators\u00a0is to convey the original poem\u2019s intent, meaning and style as faithfully as possible.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":770,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[24],"tags":[],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.0 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Poetry Translation: Problems That Come with Translating Poetry | Eurotrad<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Can a translated poem truly capture the original text? It\u2019s a question that has divided poets and translators for centuries.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.eurotrad.com\/en\/magazine\/poetry-translation-problems-come-translating-poetry\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Poetry Translation: Problems That Come with Translating Poetry | Eurotrad\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Can a translated poem truly capture the original text? It\u2019s a question that has divided poets and translators for centuries.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.eurotrad.com\/en\/magazine\/poetry-translation-problems-come-translating-poetry\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Eurotrad: Agenzia di Traduzioni\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2020-01-28T07:46:47+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2024-01-23T11:25:12+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.eurotrad.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/translating-poetry-in.jpeg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"900\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"600\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Redazione Eurotrad\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Redazione Eurotrad\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"3 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":[\"Article\",\"BlogPosting\"],\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.eurotrad.com\/en\/magazine\/poetry-translation-problems-come-translating-poetry\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.eurotrad.com\/en\/magazine\/poetry-translation-problems-come-translating-poetry\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Redazione Eurotrad\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.eurotrad.com\/en\/#\/schema\/person\/4bf8140ef38680af40179d65fae3d143\"},\"headline\":\"The Problems That Come with Translating Poetry and How to Succeed\",\"datePublished\":\"2020-01-28T07:46:47+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2024-01-23T11:25:12+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.eurotrad.com\/en\/magazine\/poetry-translation-problems-come-translating-poetry\/\"},\"wordCount\":517,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.eurotrad.com\/en\/#organization\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.eurotrad.com\/en\/magazine\/poetry-translation-problems-come-translating-poetry\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.eurotrad.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/translating-poetry-in.jpeg\",\"articleSection\":[\"Services\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.eurotrad.com\/en\/magazine\/poetry-translation-problems-come-translating-poetry\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.eurotrad.com\/en\/magazine\/poetry-translation-problems-come-translating-poetry\/\",\"name\":\"Poetry Translation: Problems That Come with Translating Poetry | Eurotrad\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.eurotrad.com\/en\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.eurotrad.com\/en\/magazine\/poetry-translation-problems-come-translating-poetry\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.eurotrad.com\/en\/magazine\/poetry-translation-problems-come-translating-poetry\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.eurotrad.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/translating-poetry-in.jpeg\",\"datePublished\":\"2020-01-28T07:46:47+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2024-01-23T11:25:12+00:00\",\"description\":\"Can a translated poem truly capture the original text? 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