After a long pause, the Wiener-Anspach Foundation is delighted to announce that its Philippe Wiener Lectures will resume on Tuesday 7 March at the Université libre de Bruxelles, with a conference by Matthew Reynolds (Professor of English and Comparative Criticism at the University of Oxford). Professor Reynolds, who will be welcomed at ULB by Sonja Janssens (École de Traduction et Interprétation ISTI – Cooremans), will deliver a lecture entitled “Prismatic Translation”.
Matthew Reynolds chairs the Oxford Comparative Criticism and Translation Research Centre (OCCT) and leads the Prismatic Translation project. Among his books are Prismatic Translation (2019), Translation: A Very Short Introduction (2016), The Poetry of Translation: From Chaucer & Petrarch to Homer & Logue (2011), Likenesses (2013), The Realms of Verse: English Poetry in a Time of Nation-Building (2001), and the novels Designs for a Happy Home (2009) and The World Was All Before Them (2013).
Abstract
The Prismatic approach considers translation, not as the production of one translated text from one source text, but as a process that inevitably generates many translated texts (both actual and potential) which need to be considered together. In this talk, Prof. Reynolds will outline the theory, and then present an example: the collaborative Prismatic Jane Eyre project, which studies Charlotte Brontë’s novel as it co-exists in around 600 translations, into at least 68 languages. How can we set about reading this plural, global, transtemporal and multilingual text? – and why should we?
The lecture will take place on Tuesday 7 March at 6.00 pm at ULB (Campus du Solbosch) in room UD6.215 (building U, entrance C, 6th floor – see map or follow this link). It will be followed by a drink. The event is free but registration is required via this page by Wednesday 1 March. After this date you can contact us at fwa.relations@ulb.be.