Translated Poe (Perspectives on Edgar Allan Poe) - Softcover

Emron Esplin; Margarida Vale De Gato

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1611461731 ISBN 13: 9781611461732

Publisher: Lehigh University Press, 2017

Synopsis

Few, if any, U.S. writers are as important to the history of world literature as Edgar Allan Poe, and few, if any, U.S. authors owe so much of their current reputations to the process of translation. Translated Poe brings together 31 essays from 19 different national/literary traditions to demonstrate Poe's extensive influence on world literature and thought while revealing the importance of the vehicle that delivers Poe to the world--translation. Translated Poe is not preoccupied with judging the "quality" of any given Poe translation nor with assessing what a specific translation of Poe must or should have done. Rather, the volume demonstrates how Poe's translations constitute multiple contextual interpretations, testifying to how this prolific author continues to help us read ourselves and the world(s) we live in. The examples of how Poe's works were spread abroad remind us that literature depends as much on authorial creation and timely readership as on the languages and worlds through which a piece of literature circulates after its initial publication in its first language. This recasting of signs and symbols that intervene in other cultures when a text is translated is one of the principal subjects of the humanistic discipline of Translation Studies, dealing with the the products, functions, and processes of translation as both a cognitive and socially regulated activity. Both literary history and the history of translation benefit from this book's focus on Poe, whose translated fortune has helped to shape literary modernity, in many cases importantly redefining the target literary systems. Furthermore, we envision this book as a fountain of resources for future Poe scholars from various global sites, including the United States, since the cases of Poe's translations--both exceptional and paradigmatic--prove that they are also levers that force the reassessment of the source text in its native literature.

About this title

Review:

[This book] offer[s] a groundbreaking examination of Poe's afterlife abroad. It is, of course, a study of Poe translation and translators, but it also goes much further using translation to illuminate the reception, interpretation, and influence of Poe's work. . . .Overall, this collection moves forward our understanding of the world-writer status of Edgar Poe in powerful and innovative ways.--The Edgar Allan Poe Review

Translated Poe [is] a collection of critical studies that must be considered as the most serious attempt to put in context both translations of Poe's oeuvre and their impact on national literatures. . . .Translated Poe is not only an ambitious book within Poe studies, but a milestone in translation studies partly thanks to the worldwide projection of the American author. It should also be considered an outstanding project for its multi-perspective analyses of translations of the fiction and poetry of one of America's most acclaimed authors. . . .The edition is almost impeccable and all chapters are read with great interest and enjoyment. In short, it seems fitting to acknowledge that Margarida Vale de Gato and Emron Esplin have successfully achieved a pioneering volume thanks to their ability to combine experts in the Poe tradition from different nationalities and accomplished translators of the American author in a great variety of languages. The volume may not only be considered a continuation of Poe Abroad, as its scope goes further beyond that of Vines' book, but a groundbreaking contribution which may soon become a landmark in Poe studies.--International Journal of English Studies

Translated Poe, however, is an extremely important study that fully adapts and concretizes this approach. Thirty one esteemed academicians who are deeply involved in literature and translation (studies) from all comers of the world, contributed to this study. Translated Poe gives sight into how the works of the poet, short story writer and literary critic Edgar Allan Poe as being one of the most significant literary figures in the 19th century have shaped literatures in nineteen different countries and also how his image has been shaped in those places. . . . The transformations driven by literary translation activities in the national literary polysystems are worth examining and illuminating in the light of translation theories. Such studies are of great importance to reveal the affiliation and interaction between literature and translation (studies) with the help of concrete examples. Thus Translated Poe fills the gap in those discussions and serves as a model for future studies. The study not only appeals to translation scholars, translation critics, students at translation departments or the ones who are in some way involved in the field but also literary scholars, critics and students of philology departments together with Poe lovers.--I.U. Journal of Translation Studies

By reading Poe in translation, and by analyzing the various transformations that occur in his poems, stories, and essays as they shift from one language to another, a richer understanding of the so-called "original" becomes not only possible but inevitable.... As a reference work, Translated Poe usefully supplements earlier transnational and global studies of Poe.--Comparative Literature Studies

The book has benefited from the contribution of a wide range of experts on both Poe and the different national literatures analysed, and the result is a selection of very high-quality papers. Furthermore, the theoretical framework of each chapter constitutes in itself an extremely complete and updated bibliography of the author and of translations studies in general. The volume ends with a very useful index of names and works, along with brief biographical notes on each contributor.... Translated Poe has already become an important reference work in its field, demonstrating the growing interest in Edgar Allan Poe and the evolution of this interest in different countries over the years. This volume proves that Poe is no longer simply an American author, but rather a universal one who has been assimilated by multiple and varied cultures. This study, though, also highlights the importance of the translator as a key figure in reception studies. Different disciplines, authors and historical periods, therefore, all intermingle in this academic work, showing that literature forms a complex network in which many different systems of thought merge.--Atlantis

Whatever our target language, whatever our region covered within, whatever our research direction, the present volume is a fascinated place to start from.--Anadiss

This is a fascinating book that makes a valuable contribution not only to Poe studies but also to the linked fields of translation studies and comparative and world literature studies. . . .In aggregate, the essays presented here--and all are of comparatively high quality, unusually so for such a large collection--make manifest Poe's enormous impact on world literature. . . .This book is a model for what can be done when translation studies and comparative and world literature studies come together productively so that the shaping power of translation in individual literatures is both acknowledged and celebrated.--Susan Bassnett, University of Warwick and University of Glasgow, UK "Poe Studies "

About the Author:

Emron Esplin is assistant professor of English at Brigham Young University. Margarida Vale de Gato is assistant professor at the University of Lisbon and a researcher of its English Studies Centre (ULICES).

About this edition

• Publisher: Lehigh University Press
• Publication date: 2017
• ISBN 10: 1611461731
• ISBN 13: 9781611461732
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 464