Prefaces in Soviet translations of Robert Burns’s poetry as ideological tools
Published online: 16 November 2021
https://doi.org/10.1075/target.20082.kal
https://doi.org/10.1075/target.20082.kal
Abstract
This article focuses on the ideological content and function of the prefaces that accompany the translations of foreign literature made in the Soviet Union. The aim of the article is to demonstrate how these translations use paratexts to comply with the target system’s ideological constraints. It shows how the ways in which the Soviet authorities used paratexts to manipulate representations of the author of the source text and the text itself reflect the power structures within the target system. The empirical investigation draws on a close lexical analysis of ideologemes in two prefaces that accompanied Soviet translations of Robert Burns’s poetry.
Keywords: preface, ideology, manipulation, translation, Robert Burns
Article outline
- 1.Introduction
- 2.Theoretical background
- 3.Translation of foreign literature in the Soviet Union
- 4.Prefaces to translations of Burns’s work
- 5.Ideologemes
- 6.Morozov’s preface
- 7.Tvardovsky’s preface
- 8.Conclusion
- Notes
References
References (48)
Bednarczyk, Anna. 2014. “Политические контексты переводческой деятельности (перевод переводчик политика в польском и русском социокультурном пространстве) [Political contexts of translation activities (translation, translator, politics in Polish and Russian sociocultural discourse].” Zagadnienia Rodzajow Literchich LVII/1: 254–271.
De-you, Yang. 1987. “On Marshak’s Russian Translation of Robert Burns.” Studies in Scottish Literature 22 (1): 10–29.
Dimitriu, Rodica. 2009. “Translators’ Prefaces as Documentary Sources for Translation Studies.” Perspectives: Studies in Translation Theory and Practice 17 (3): 193–206.
Genette, Gerard. 1997. Paratexts: Thresholds of Interpretation. [orig. Seuils]. Translated by Jane E. Lewin. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Gil-Bajardí, Anna, Pilar Orero, and Sara Rovira-Esteva, eds. 2012. Translation Peripheries: Paratextual Elements in Translation. Bern: Peter Lang.
Goryaeva Tatiana. 2009. Политическая цензура в СССР. 1917–1991 гг [Political censorship in the USSR. 1917–1991]. ROSSPEN: Moscow.
Gusejnov, Gasan. 2004. D.S.P. Советские Идеологемы в Русском Дискурсе 1990-х [Soviet ideologemes in Russian discourse of the 1990s]. Moscow: Tri kvadrata.
Haroon, Haslina. 2017. “The Translator’s Preface as a Paratextual Device in Malay–English Literary Translations.” Translation & Interpreting 9 (2): 100–113.
Harvey, Keith. 2003. “‘Events’ and ‘Horizons’: Reading Ideology in the ‘Bindings’ of Translations.” In Apropos of Ideology: Translation Studies on Ideology – Ideologies in Translation Studies, edited by María Calzada-Pérez, 43–70. Manchester: St. Jerome.
Kaloh Vid, Natalia. 2007. “Use of Domesticated and Foreignized Methods in the Soviet School of Translation.” Elope 1 (2): 151–159.
. 2011a. “Robert Burns’s ‘The Twa Dogs’: Ideological Aspects of Translation into Russian.” Scottish Literary Review 3 (1): 1–20.
. 2011b. Ideological Translation of Robert Burns’s Poetry in Russia and in the Soviet Union. Slovenia: Mednarodna založba Oddelka za slovanske jezike in književnosti: Filozofska fakulteta.
. 2014a. “Translating Love and the Erotic in the Soviet Union: The Case of Robert Burns’s Poetry.” In Forces of the Erotic: Past and Present Transgressions, Transformations and Bliss, edited by Doreen Bauschke and Dena Gilby, 133–149. Oxford: Inter-Disciplinary Press.
. 2014b. “The Reception of Robert Burns in Russia.” In The Reception of Robert Burns in Europe, edited by Murray Pittock, 155–178. London: Bloomsbury.
. 2015a. “Translations of Robert Burns in the Soviet Union: What is Hidden Between the Lines?” In Preklad a kultúra 5. 11, edited by Edita Gromová and Mária Kusá, 59–69. Nitra: Univerzita Konštanina Filzofa v Nitre/Filozoficka fakula.
. 2015b. “A Comrade or a Mistress? Translations of Robert Burns’s Erotic Poetry in the Soviet Union.” In PanEroticism, edited by Ben Ambler, Ana Došen, and Kristina Kočan, 13–20. Oxford: Inter-Disciplinary Press.
. 2017. “Translations of Robert Burns’ Poetry in the Soviet Union: Ideological Aspects.” In Translation, the Canon and its Discontent: Version and Subversion, edited by Miguel Ramalhete Gomes, 93–109. Newcastle upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars.
. 2018. “Translations of Robert Burns in the Russian Book Market: The Old and the New.” Studies in Scottish Literature 44 (1): 13–20.
. 2019. “Role of Paratexts in Mediating Ideologically Adapted Translations in the Soviet Union: The Case of Robert Burns.” Belgrade English Language & Literature Studies 111: 247–265.
Kaloh Vid, Natalia, and Koletnik, Mihaela. 2020. “Dialect in Poetic Translations: The Case of Robert Burns’ Poetry in Russia and in Slovenia.” Slavia Centralis 13 (1): 7–21.
Kamovnikova, Natalia. 2019. Made Under Pressure: Literary Translation in the Soviet Union, 1960–1991. Massachusetts: University of Massachusetts Press.
Kovala, Urpo. 1996. “Translations, Paratextual Mediation, and Ideological Closure.” Target 8 (1): 119–147.
Kupina, Nadezhda. 2000. “Языковое строительство: от системы идеологем к системе культурем. [The language construction: From the system of ideologeme to the system of cultureme].” Русский язык сегодня [Russian language today] 11: 182–189.
Lefevere, André. 1992. Translation, Rewriting, and the Manipulation of Literary Fame. London: Routledge.
. 1998. “Translation Practice(s) and the Circulation of Cultural Capital: Some Aeneids in English.” In Constructing Cultures: Essays on Literary Translation Topics in Translation, edited by Susan Bassnett and André Lefevere, 41–56. Clevedon: Multilingual Matters.
Lenin, Vladimir. 1967. Полное собрание сочинений [The collected works]. Ed. 5. T.10. Moscow: Izdateljstvo politicheskoj literatury.
Lylo, Taras. 2017. “Ideologeme as a Representative of the Basic Concepts of Ideology in the Media Discourse.” Social Communication (3) 11: 14–20.
Malysheva, Elena G. 2019. “Ideologeme as Lingo-Cognitive Phenomenon: Definition and Classification.” Translated by I. S. Pirozhkova. Political Linguistics 1 (73): 134–144.
Maclean, Marie. 1991. “Pretexts and Paratexts: The Art of the Peripheral.” New Literary History (22) 21: 273–279.
Manning, Scott. 2021. “Battle of Bannockburn.” Encyclopedia Britannica. Accessed October 12, 2021. [URL].
McRae, Ellen. 2012. “The Role of Translators’ Prefaces to Contemporary Literary Translations into English: An Empirical Study.” In Anna Gil-Bajardí, Pilar Orero, and Sara Rovira-Esteva (2012, 63–82).
Morozov, Aleksander. 1947. “Предисловие [Preface].” In Роберт Бернс в переводах С. Маршака. Избранное [Robert Burns in S. Marshak’s translations. Selected], by Robert Burns, translated by Samuil Marshak, iii–x. Moscow: Goslitizdat.
. 1976. “Комментарии [Comments].” In Роберт Бернс. Стихи [Robert Burns. Poems], by Robert Burns, translated by Samuil Marshak, 366–374. Moscow: Khudozhestvennaya literatura.
Nahimova Elena. 2011. “Идеологемы ‘Сталин’ в современной массовой коммуникации [Ideologemes of Stalin in contemporary mass communication].” Politicheskaya lingvistika 2 (36): 152–156.
Norberg, Ulf. 2012. “Literary Translators’ Comments on Their Translations in Prefaces and Afterwords: The Case of Contemporary Sweden.” In Anna Gil-Bajardí, Pilar Orero, and Sara Rovira-Esteva (2012, 101–116).
Pellatt, Valerie, ed. 2013. Text, Extratext, Metatext and Paratext in Translation. Newcastle upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars.
Pingping, Hou. 2013. “Paratexts in the English Translation of the Selected Works of Mao Tse-tung.” In Text, Extratext, Metatext and Paratext in Translation, edited by Valeria Pellatt, 33–49. Newcastle upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars.
Riera, Jorge Braga. 2018. “The Role of Epitexts in Drama Translation.” In Taking Stock and Audiovisual Translation, edited by Juan José Martinez Sierra, special issue of JoSTrans 301: 249–268.
Rolf, Malte. 2009. “A Hall of Mirrors: Sovietizing Culture Under Stalinism.” Slavic Review 68 (3): 601–630.
Sherry, Samantha. 2012. Censorship in Translation in the Soviet Union in the Stalin and Khrushchev Eras. PhD diss. University of Edinburgh.
Stratford, Madeleine, and Louis Jolicoeur. 2014. “La littérature québécoise traduite au Mexique : Trois anthologies à la Foire internationale du livre de Guadalajara [Quebec literature translated in Mexico: Three anthologies at the Guadalajara International Book Fair].” Meta 59 (1): 97–123.
Tahir-Gürçağlar, Şehnaz. 2002. “What Texts Don’t Tell: The Uses of Paratexts in Translation Research.” In Crosscultural Transgressions: Research Models in Translation Studies II: Historical and Ideological Issues, edited by Theo Hermans, 44–60. Manchester: St. Jerome.
. 2013. “The Nature and Functions of Allographic Prefaces in Translated Works: An Initial Exploration of the Turkish Context.” In Authorial and Editorial Voices in Translation 2: Editorial and Publishing Practice, edited by Hanne Jansen and Anna Wegener, 89–108. Montréal: Éditions québécoises de l’œuvre.
Tamba, Andreea-Mihaela. 2013. “Translating vs. Rewriting During the Romanian Communist Period – Prefaces to Translations of Vanity Fair and Tess of the d’Urbervilles.” Philologica Jassyensia 2 (18): 261–270.
Toury, Gideon. 1995. Descriptive Translation Studies – and Beyond. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
Tvardovsky, Aleksander. 1976. “Предисловие [Preface].” In Роберт Бернс в переводах Самуила Маршака [Robert Burns in translations by Samuil Marshak], by Robert Burns, translated by Samuil Marshak, 20–25. Moscow: Khudozhestvennaya literatura.