Translations

TRANSLATIONS 77 riche veuve morte etouffee par un OS de pouletapparait trop previsible. La piece reserve achacun des personnages principaux un long monologue, Ie dernier elant, bien sill, reserve ii la Sagouine bien que, pour les effets comiques, Ie plus reussi soit celui de la Sainte. Si l'on veut verifier jusqu'ou Ie theatre quebecois recent poursuit son mouvement de retour au texte, en meme temps qu'il se degage de toute reference apparente a la thematique nationaliste, il faut lire Fragments d'une lettre d'adieu Ius par des geologues. Piece statique s'il en est: ['auteur indique que 'les personnages restent en scene, assis, pendant toute la duree de la piece: Six hommes et une femme qui se nomment Macurdy, Lenowski, Saikir, Oshwald, qui viennent de tous les horizons ethniques, donnent tour ii tour leur version des derniers jours d'un geologue mort au Cambodge. II y a Iii quatre geologues, un ingenieur et un medecin, qui exposent au president - avec force details savants sur Ie spiraloide et l'anhydride sulfureux, decrivant les crues du Mekong en les comparant a celles du Nil bleu - leur version des faits. Un texte d'une remarquable precision technique et dont la difficulte n'est aucunement occultee par les deplacements de personnages ou par quelque theme accrocheur. L'auteur parle encore d'un 'septuor' ou meme les 'silences sont ecrits, qui font partie de la piece: Cela ferait songer ii la musique contemporaine, a laquelle il faut etre initie. La piece n'a pas encore ete creee. II reste donc a savoir si Ie bonheur de lecture qu'on eprouve, comme une sorte de miracle, peut se transmettre it la representation: un bonheur qui tient aun profond lyrisme qui finit par deborder de ces recits convergents, lesquels nous depeignent un mysterieux geologue ala poursuite de sa mort autant que de prouesses techniques. Une ceuvre qui confirme !'immense talent de Normand Chaurette, en meme temps que son refus de toute facilite. Translations BARBARA GODARD 'THIS IS NOT A TRANSLATION: With this knowing wink to Foucault and Magritte, Hedi Bouraoui begins his foreword to his 're-creation: Echosmos (Mosaic Press and Canadian Society for the Comparative Study of Civilizations , 236, $13.00), published in a bilingual edition. This selftranslation is the repetition of a process as distinguished from the translation of another's work which is the reproduction of a product. As such, it exemplifies a growing interest in experimental translation by Canadian poets and a broadening of the definition of translation to include all forms of re-writing. For a long time, the story of translation has been 'the handmaid's tale: Translation has been viewed as a secondary activity: the translator per- 78 LETTERS IN CANADA 1986 ceived to be mechanically transcoding signs from one language to another. But this self-effacing translator who produces transparent texts through which the thoughts of a writer are expressed in the target language as though sthe has written it her/himself is being replaced by a highly visible translator who foregrounds histher function as active reading /writing, a producer of meaning in the transference of texts from one literary system to another within the complex polysystem of this multilingual country. There are many signs that change is occurring. One of them is the increased visibility of the translator as evidenced in the conference organized in Montreal during October 1986 by the Association of Literary Translators of Canada in conjunction with the American Literary Translators Association. Joining these two groups for discussions and papers on the complexities of interlingual transference was a group of international translators of Canadian and Quebec literatures from countries as far distant as China and Finland. Further evidence of the increased recognition for translation is the founding of an academic society for Translation Studies. This will expand opportunities for the serious examination of the translator's craft which until now has lacked a forum in this country. A second sign of change is the increasing interest of creative writers in translating, evidence that translation is now perceived to be one among many modes of re/writing. Writing, 16 (October 1986) published Susanne de Lotbiniere-Harwood's translation of a text by...