The translator's turn By Douglas Robinson (review)

BOOK NOTICES 867 for special mention: Olga Koutna traces the history of the classification of the Romance languages from the 16th century up to modern times (287-300), identifying three models of classification—(i) those based on extralinguistic criteria, (ii) linguistically-based classifications (stemming mainly from the Schleicherian family -tree concept), and (iii) sociolinguistic models. Jana Prívratská's essay (349-55) on Comenius' idea of a universal language is the paper that strikes me as the most interesting in Ch. 6. The second volume covers the 18th—20th centuries . The names of Herder, Condillac, and W. von Humboldt appear almost everywhere in discussions of the 19th and 20th centuries, and there are several contributions on various aspects of the linguistic thought of these pioneers. An example is the paper by Werner Bahner, who examines Herder's understanding of language in relation to Condillac and von Humboldt (493-503). Understandably, the 19th century is treated most extensively. This is the period, especially the 1870s and 1880s, that gave birth to the scientific study of language. Seventeen papers have been grouped together in this section; some of the best-known names in linguistics of the time figure among the topics of the essays, which range from treatments of phonetics and the origin and evolution of language to appraisals of the work of individual linguists and debates about specific problems in different countries. Among the papers in this chapter are Maria Tsiapera's essay (577-87) on the organic metaphor and its significance for the development of the historical study of the language in the 19th c. ; the paper by Manfred Kohrt (589603 ) on the concept of 'system' in 19th-c. linguistics ; Hartmut Schmidt's paper (606- 18) on A. von Humboldt's theory of language and linguistics ; Joan Leopold's discussion (633-45) of Darwin's ideas on the origin of language; Johanna Radwanska Williams' essay (653-65) on the reception of Kruszewski's linguistic theories by his contemporaries; the paper by Pierre Swiggers & Willy van Hoecke (66776 ) on Bréal's contribution to our understanding of linguistic change; Simone Delesalle's paper (677-87) about the multitalented La Grasserie , particularly his role in linguistics at the turn of the 20th century; and Elke Nowak's paper (759-71) on Kleinschmidt's grammar of Greenlandic. Ch. 9 contains, among others, papers by John Hewson (787-94) on the origin and evolution of the idea of 'system' in language. He says that system is frequently sought in the wrong place, and argues that 'system is only to be found in tongue, in langue'. Finally, W. Terrence Gordon 's paper (821-32) deals with the important notion ofgeometrical representation of meaning by the triangle (Ogden & Richards) and the subsequent debate and Hockett's modified model of the four triangles. In general, the essays in the collection are illuminating, and some of them bring to light unknown aspects of the history of linguistic science , especially those in Chs. 3-7. The papers are written in English, German, French, Italian (1), and Spanish (1). The two indices, authors (848-63) and subjects (865-73), in Vol. 2 are helpful as guides through the vast amount of material collected here. The work is a good source of information on a wide range of topics, and for those interested in the history of linguistics this collection is a real thesaurus. [Georgios Giannakis, University ofCalifornia at Los Angeles.] The translator's turn. By Douglas Robinson. Baltimore & London: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1991. Pp. xviii, 318. Cloth $42.00, paper $14.95. Over the last twenty-five years a large number ofbooks have been published on translation and translation theory. In recent years the development has been away from an objectivist, categorial discussion of translation theory to a holistic, 'text-in-situation' approach which tries to incorporate linguistic and extralinguistic factors equally. In the present book, R takes a similar holistic stance but at the same time argues against what he calls 'mainstream translation theory'. His book is divided into two parts, 'Dialogical bodies' and 'Dialogical turns, and these are subdivided into two chapters each: 'The somatics of translation' (3-64), 'The dialogics of translation' (65-123), 'The tropics of...