Translation and the Problem of Preservation of Cultural Memory

Session Submission Type: Panel

Brief Description

The panel addresses the role of translation in preserving cultural memory in the face of the state-imposed amnesia promoted by the 20th century totalitarian regimes. During the most radical period of denial of freedom “resistance consisted of remembering” (Grudzinska-Gross 1987: 387). Some poets took upon themselves the task of being witnesses of history, of preserving for future generations the memory of the lives, deeds, suffering, and deaths of their contemporaries. The panel highlights the tensions, which appear in the field of cultural preservation, especially, when it comes to translation of poetry, but also of poetry-like prose – a creative activity that by definition entails some semantic losses, including those of cultural memory.

Sub Unit

• Literature: 20th Century

Chair

• Daria Smirnova, Duke U

Papers

• Gorbanevskaya Translating Miłosz: Allegiances to Competing Cultural Memories - Zakhar Ishov, Uppsala U (Sweden)

• Remembrance and Its Variations: Issues of Translation (Nabokov’s 'Drugie berega' and 'Speak, Memory') - Julia Trubikhina, CUNY Hunter College

• Samizdat Translation and the Journal Predlog - Laura Little, Connecticut College

• Digging a Grave in the Air: Paul Celan as Translator and Translatee - Laurence H Bogoslaw, East View Information Services

Discussant

• Shelley Fairweather-Vega, FairVega Translations & Library Services