Revised translations, revised identities

This article is a case study that aims to illustrate the process of formation of one translator’s professional identity and to discuss the shifts in translators’ professional behavior at different stages of the translators’ life in relation to changing social and personal settings. It will focus on three Japanese versions of one Russian text, Anton Chekhov’s letters to his wife, all produced by Yuasa Yoshiko (family name first), a female translator of Russian literature, whose professional career began in the late 1920s. From the 1990s on, especially after the establishment of the Yuasa Yoshiko Award for the best translation of a foreign language stage play in 1994, she has become the focus of several academic studies and biographical works. Surprisingly enough, none of these emphasizes her translation activities or focuses on the texts of her translations. The purpose of the present study is to fill this lacuna in the research on Yuasa.