ABSTRACT
Normative model As it has been conceived in Western culture , translation theory is normative. Since its ori gins in Cicero's instructions to the orator and Horace's instructions to the poet, Western translation theory has restrictively consisted of instructions to someone on how to translate: CICERO (see LATIN TRADffiON) and Horace tell their readers not to rework foreign texts in Latin word for word, like slavish translators , but freely , like an orator (as Cicero says), or like someone claiming private property in public ground (as Horace says). Translators in those days were thought of as blind literalists, and both Cicero and Horace wanted to warn people translating orations or literary works from Greek into Latin against acting like translators - not, in other words, to obey the implicit translation norm but to develop a new, freer, more creative norm.
