1st Edition
Metatranslation Essays on Translation and Translation Studies
Metatranslation presents a selection of 14 key essays by leading theorist, Theo Hermans, covering a span of almost 40 years. The essays trace Hermans’ work and demonstrate how translation studies has evolved from the 1980s into the much more diverse and self-reflexive discipline it is today.
The book is divided into three main sections: the first section explores the status and central concerns of translation studies, including the growing interest in sociological, ideological and ethical approaches to translation; the second section investigates the key concepts of translation norms and of the translator’s presence, or positioning, in translated texts; the historical essays in the final section are concerned with both modern and early modern discourses on translation and with the use of translation as an instrument of war and propaganda.
This synthesis of the work of a highly influential pioneer in translation studies is essential reading for researchers, scholars and advanced students of translation studies, intercultural studies and comparative literature.
Sources and Acknowledgements
Introduction
Part 1: Approaches
1 Translations’ Other [1996]
2 Paradoxes and Aporias in Translation and Translation Studies [2002]
3 Translation, Irritation and Resonance [2007]
4 What Is Translation? [2013]
5 Untranslatability, Entanglement and Understanding [2019]
Part 2: Concepts
6 Translational Norms and Correct Translations [1991]
7 Translation and Normativity [1998]
8 The Translator’s Voice in Translated Narrative [1996]
9 Positioning Translators: Voices, Views and Values in Translation [2014]
Part 3: Histories
10 Images of Translation. Metaphor and Imagery in the Renaissance Discourse on Translation [1985]
11 The Task of the Translator in the European Renaissance. Explorations in a Discursive Field [1997]
12 Miracles in Translation. Justus Lipsius, Our Lady of Halle and Two Dutch Translations (2015)
13 Schleiermacher (2019)
Index
Biography
Theo Hermans is Emeritus Professor in the Centre for Translation Studies at University College London (UCL). His monographs include Translation in Systems (1999; reissued as a Routledge Translation classic in 2020), The Conference of the Tongues (2007) and Translation and History (2022).
Theo Hermans has been one of the most intelligent and searching voices of the Translation Studies field for going on a half century now – one of the most wide-ranging and thoughtful voices, but also one of the most transformative – and this collection gathers fourteen of his most important articles since 1985. There is no better place to go for the newcomer interested in an introduction to the field – or for us old-timers interested in reliving that history.
– Douglas Robinson
Professor Hermans, one of the most distinguished voices in contemporary Translation Studies, brings together in this timely collection of classic essays what is the gist of an original thinking that has influenced generations of scholars and, taken together, offers a true guide to the future of the discipline.
– Ovidi Carbonell Cortés, University of Salamanca, Spain
This volume is not just a collection of thought-provoking essays on all things translational by one of the most influential scholars in translation studies – it is a map of key conceptual and methodological explorations in the discipline in the last four decades.
– Piotr Blumczynski, Queen's University Belfast, UK
