ABSTRACT
This chapter title is complementary to the concerns pointed out in Chapter 5. It selects (from works already introduced in Chapter 5) specimens from the four genres – Fiction, Short Fiction, Poetry and Drama – and studies the nuances of the translation act. For instance, it highlights the combination of methods Lakshmi Holmstrom employs in rendering the vocabulary and syntax from Tamil to English in Pudumaipittan’s and Mauni’s stories. It focuses on the feminist turns of speech in women’s poetry and the subversive force of stichomythic dialogue in Indira Parthasarathy’s drama. The overall purpose is to demonstrate how translation effects a transference of the knowledge of culture. It must be understood that translation in the contemporary situation is somewhat different and performs a more frontal role. It operates in a polyphonic context when there is subversion, leading to a cultural crisis in most parts of the world, especially in the Tamil region. Translation activity has correspondingly reinvented itself as an active resonator. English has acted in this context as an efficient catalyst.
