ABSTRACT
This chapter explores the method of translation of Brazilian poet Haroldo de Campos that he termed ‘transcreation,’ which is the practice of translation creative texts chosen from world literature. Campos evaluates the lexical, sonorous, visual and rhythmic qualities of the text before re-inventing them and re-writing them in Portuguese. It is a search for solutions that reflect as much the aesthetic expression of the original as its linguistic structure and graphic form. The translator alternates between attention to the linguistic composition of the original and attention to a creative re-writing. The ‘transcreative’ method is illustrated with poems from Latin, English, Italian, French, Greek, as well as from languages new to the poet. A main characteristic of transcreation is research, that is, the comparative study of sources and the analysis of meaning. In the work of transcreation, the researcher, the scholar, the historian, the comparatist and the musician all collaborate in the same person. The internationalisation of the creative conscience, in an avant-garde context, is one of the main contributions of transcreation to contemporary Brazilian literature.
