ABSTRACT
This paper focuses on how the theme of betrayal in translation (or interpretation) is often treated in fiction in terms of love triangles in which the interpreter's 'betrayal' of the original is associated with some form of competition (between an interpreter and an author) for the love of a woman. The objects of analysis are the following works of fiction: Italo Calvino's Se una notte d'inverno un viaggiatore (first published in Italy in 1979), and Moacyr Scliar's short story entitled 'Notas ao Pé da Página' (published in Brazil in 1995). This type of analysis may help us further understand the often negative reputation translators seem to have in a culture that worships originals and tends to reject any activity that somehow 'touches' them. It may also help us reflect on why mainstream translation theories have always been so interested in controlling and disciplining translators and their 'subversive' interventions in the texts they necessarily have to rewrite.
