Repensar la lengua y la traducción a través de poetas ficcionales y traductores en The Translator de John Crowley

Abstract

John Crowley, the contemporary American fiction writer, in his novel entitled The Translator (2002), depicts not only the chaotic zeitgeist dominating the universe since the 1960s but also his interpretation of the power of language in the self/other relations as well as interlinguistic and crosscultural exchanges. This article, thus, examines how The Translator depicts finding one’s self through the other’s being, worldview, ideology, and definitely language through Bakhtinian theories on language, poetry, translation, as well as theories on the translation of poetry. The self/other relationship does not only evoke a bodily difference, but even more includes the differences of language, culture, and ideology. The bond between the two characters, Christa and Falin, representing USA and USSR during the Cold War years, who are their opposites in terms of gender, age, education, language, culture, ideology, personal and public history and experience, constitutes a dialogical relationship based on poetry, specifically poetry written in their native tongues, English and Russian respectively. Both Christa and Falin bring their own voices to this partnership of poetry and translation which eventually leads to the (re)construction and (re)shaping of their own selves. Christa and Falin have not only translated poetry but also developed an intense relationship; it is as if they have translated their selves into each during translation, as well as the foreign language, have become attractive and seductive. Crowley calls for the importance of the multiplicity of language because one’s voice, one’s own sense of self, gradually emerges from the multiplicity of voices encountered and interacted with.