ABSTRACT
Like all serious academics, I begin with a comment by Walter Benjamin that Homi Bhaba quotes at the head of a chapter in his The Location of Culture (1994): “Translation passes through continua of transformation, not abstract ideas of identity and similarity” (214). Whether cultural translation, which implies a language that is performative and active, or literary translation, where the language is formulative or enunciatory, the transformational process cannot (or possibly doesn’t want to) ensure a sense of belonging. The separated textuality of the translated text is proposed by, among others, the new signifying and stylizing practices, and a new order of expression that put a lot of ground between the ur-text and the finished product. Translation from one language to another is burdened with difficulties at the best of times – even for a person who knows both the source and target languages perfectly. A good translator is a person for whom the language of translation is also the language of creativity. One cannot be a good translator in a language one has not mastered and made one's own. All good translations must convey not just the meaning of the original in another language but must exploit the resources of the target language to convey not an exact equivalent of the verbal pleasure of the original piece of writing but in an equitable way.
With the problem of linguistic and cultural translation gaining predominance in postcolonial studies, this chapter attempts to evaluate practical issues and problems related to translation in the Indian scenario primarily in four categories. First is when the author himself/herself acts as the translator of his/her own text. Translating a work like Joginder Paul's Sleepwalkers by someone closely related to the author forms the focus of the second category. The third category comprises of different versions of translating the same text by academics and freelancers. To focus upon the fourth and final category, that translates text from one medium to another, I will use cinematic translations of adapted texts. Though she propagated such values as ‘integrity,’ ‘responsibility,’ ‘fidelity,’ ‘boldness,’ ‘humility,’ and ‘ethical understanding’ in the translator, the critic Susan Sonag does not define who an ‘ideal’ translator is. Thus this problem remains open-ended till date.
