Book of Abstracts

“Traduttore Traditore: The Instrumentalism of Conventional Wisdom”

Lawrence VENUTI

Temple University

Since antiquity, regardless of time and place, language and culture, the discourse on translation has been mired in clichés. The cliché may be a dichotomy indicating opposed translation strategies. Perhaps the most famous example is European, “word-for-word” vs. “sense-for-sense,” which dates back to Cicero’s De optimo genere oratorum (46 BCE) but is decisively formulated in Jerome’s Epistula LVII (395 CE). Similar dichotomies occur in Asian cultures as well, such as “unhewn” vs. “refined,” which is reported to have appeared in Zhi Qian’s preface to his Chinese version of the Buddhist sutra Dharmapada (third century CE).

The cliché may also develop into a fully-fledged proverb about translation, a pithy statement that is believed to encapsulate an accepted truth and therefore to be worthy of repeated application, whether in elite or in popular cultures. Here belong catchphrases like “traduttore traditore” (1539) and Robert Frost’s “poetry is what gets lost in translation” (1959). Even Jacques Derrida’s paradox--“Rein n’est intraduisible en un sens, mais en un autre sens tout est intraduisible” (1996) - has now been used so many times as to have become a theoretical chestnut. These discursive phenomena indicate not only that translation has long been the site of rote thinking, but also that it has been grounded on an instrumental model in which it is understood as the reproduction or transfer of an invariant contained in or caused by the source text, an invariant form, meaning, and effect.

My lecture initiates a rigorous interrogation of proverbial expressions where instrumentalism continues to limit translation commentary. I will start with an examination of the proverb as a genre that is metaphorical and then return a particular translation proverb--“traduttore traditore” - to various contexts where it has been used, both originary and subsequent. The first published use of this proverb seems to have been a sixteenth-century Italian satire, whereafter it was developed in French by sixteenth-century authors, notably the poet Joachim du Bellay. Modern uses examined in the lecture include: a 1929 letter to the editor of the London Times about international business transactions; John Frederick Nims’s 1952 review of Roy Campbell’s translation of San Juan de la Cruz’s poetry for Poetry magazine; Roman Jakobson’s 1959 essay, “On Linguistic Aspects of Translation”; and Arthur Sze’s introduction to his 2001 collection, Silk Dragon: Translations from the Chinese. The discussion explores how instrumentalism preempts an understanding of translation as an interpretive act that inevitably varies source-text form, meaning, and effect even when the translator maintains a semantic correspondence and a stylistic approximation. At the same time, instrumentalism restricts the definition of the translator’s linguistic competence and leads to notions of untranslatability. Yet if translation is indeed an interpretation, no text is untranslatable since every text can be interpreted. My aim is to defamiliarize notions that have come to be all too familiar as truths of translation, to show how they actually limit thinking about what translation is and does, and to indicate other, more productive directions that thinking can take.

“Scientific Encyclopaedia or Literature of Marvels? Reconsidering Qazwini’s Cosmography within its Epistemological Framework”

Marco AMMAR

Università degli Studi di Urbino “Carlo Bo”

Qazwini’s Cosmography is among the most well-known and widespread encyclopaedic digests written in the Muslim classical world. The extant illustrated manuscripts scattered in libraries all over the world and the several translations in Persian and Turkish bear witness to the great influence this book exerted between the XIII and XVIII centuries.

Despite popularity in the East, eminent 20^th -century Western scholars have strongly questioned its scholarly value due to its inclusion of many fantastic tales and anecdotes which fill its pages, and which allegedly amount to a convincing proof of its unscientific nature. Qazwini’s Cosmography was harshly criticised and often quoted to illustrate the decadence of Islamic sciences (Von Grunebaum 1947). The author was largely discredited for having uncritically drawn on previous knowledge and his Cosmography was deemed as nothing more than mere plagiarism (Kowalska 1967and Wiet 1966). Qazwini’s digest was ultimately either downgraded to pseudoscience and superstitious lore or simply classified as ‘Aja’ib literature (“Literature of Marvels”).

Conversely, recent studies have highlighted the weakness of the concept of

“Literature of Marvels” as well as the grave inconsistency of its application (Von Hees 2010). The issue of veracity and authenticity, that pertains to wondrous accounts in avowedly scientific works, has been explored from new perspectives (Zadeh 2010). This paper seeks to shed light on some of the principles that inform Islamic medieval knowledge, bringing to the fore the crucial significance that time and cultural boundaries share with linguistic boundaries in any given text transfer process. Therefore, Islamic medieval literature should always be evaluated on its own terms, and as free as possible from Western bias. Once anchored to its original frame of reference, Qazwini’s Cosmography proves to be a fully-fledged scientific encyclopaedia, complying with the epistemic standards in force within the cultural context it was conceived.

“Shapes of Things: Translating the Bamboo Manuscript Version(s) of the Fan wu liu xing (ca. IV-III century B.C.)”

Attilio ANDREINI

Università Ca’ Foscari Venezia

The Fan wu liu xing 凡物流形 (FWLX, “Things with no exception are shifting [from form in]to form”, or “All the Things are Flowing into Form”) was missing among the received tradition of early Chinese texts. In the spring of 1994, two versions were found in a Hong Kong antiquities market among some 1200 bamboo slips, which appeared to be similar in age and physical/graphic features to the texts excavated from Guodian 郭店 tomb n. 1 in 1993. The whole set of bamboo-texts was purchased by the Shanghai Museum. Radiocarbon and other analysis conducted by the Shanghai Museum and the Chinese Academy of Sciences on the bamboo slips

confirmed that they are dateable to the late Warring States period (IV-III century B.C.). The FWLX was first published in volume VII of the Shanghai Museum bamboo texts collection (Ma Chengyuan 馬承源, ed., Shanghai Bowuguan cang zhanguo Chu zhu shu VII 上海博物館藏戰國楚竹書（七）, Shanghai, Shanghai guji, 2008).

The text starts with a series of interrogations as to what makes possible to the so called ‘Ten Thousand things’ (wanwu 萬物) to become what they actually are. The process common to all things starts with a formless condition, followed by a quasifluid state (liuxing 流形) which is leading up to a complete structured form (cheng ti 成體 ). Despite the highest degree of instability during each phase of the transformation process, there is an underlying force which makes possible the opposite energies present in nature to interact, to converge and to complete themselves: the One (yi 一), the ultimate and unconditioned reality.

“Translating Ancient Chinese Jokes: On the Problem of Translating Culture and Language”

Giulia BACCINI

Università Ca’ Foscari Venezia

Culture affects the forms which humour takes in a society and the perception of what it is appropriate or inappropriate to laugh at in a given situation – that is, the type of targets and sources of humour (objects, roles, etc.). As a culturally determined phenomenon, it is not always possible to enjoy humour across centuries or between different cultures. As far as Chinese jestbooks are concerned, readers need a certain amount of knowledge of pre-modern Chinese culture to appreciate most of the anecdotes recorded in these texts. However, it is possible to find several examples in which jokes can be immediately understood without a deep knowledge of the source culture, because they concern general targets found in other societies too, or because they play on simple situations of incongruity which are easy to understand.

Humour is also difficult to translate. In translating jokes, we face several challenges: to maintain their cultural references without burdening the story with too many footnotes, to preserve puns and wordplay, or to make evident textual references in parodic allusions.

In my presentation, I will discuss some examples of humorous anecdotes collected in the first two jestbooks transmitted, Xiaolin 笑林 [Forest of Laughter] (third century

CE) and Qiyan lu 啓顔錄 [Record of Bright Smiles] (fifth-sixth century CE), to highlight the challenges they present when we try to effectively convey the taste and culture of a specific period.

“Intersections, Interactions, Integrations: Chronological Entanglement of a Chinese Poem”

Cosima BRUNO

SOAS, University of London

Translating from one medium into another, for example from music into poetry, constitutes an extended idea of translation, in which the radical reshaping of the original into the poem is conscious and embraced.

In this paper I will explore a contemporary Chinese poem as an intermedial translation of an intermedial source text (musical and verbal).

The aim is twofold: to understand what intermedial translation means in practice, and at the same time draw from this analytical exploration theoretical propositions that can help us reconceptualize literary belonging and cross-cultural encounters.

I therefore will take this poem to constitute a productive conjecture to alter geometries of attention, from a notion of translation as something that deals with the problem of the incommensurability of the material conditions of languages to one that transcends such incommensurability. In fact, the poem is here to be considered as both an original and a translation at the same time.

I will first look at how to evaluate sameness and difference between the two texts under scrutiny; I will then move onto some theoretical considerations which could be applied to the study of other cross-cultural encounters.

Primary questions include: Where does this poem begin? What does this poem translate? What is its intended readership?

The metaphor underscoring my exploration will be that one of the “skein of yarn” (Calvino), or of the spinning of a “thread” (Wittgenstein), that is an image reporting on relational theories of literature, history and translation.

“Translating from Arabic today: nothing is forever”

Isabella CAMERA D’AFFLITTO

Sapienza Università Roma

In collective imagination, translator is considered a solitary one, learned, careful and sometimes weird, doing an extremely static and sedentary job, in front of his pc, surrounded by books and dictionaries, while looking for the best choice, in order to write in his own language, “almost the same thing”.

But as we all know, translation is not an exact science, the pursuit of the right word is often an exhausting and frustrating task, and the times when the translator regrets his choices are not rare. Because, actually, translation is not, or at least should not be a solitary work, and above all it cannot be something static and immutable. In this paper I will try to argue these statements of mine, focusing on my own professional experience.

“The Difficult Art of Publishing. Acquiring, Translating and Selling the novel A modo nostro by Chen He”

Mattia CARRATELLO

Sellerio Editore

Sellerio Editore decided some years ago that Chinese literature would deserve a larger place in Italian publishing, in an effort to introduce Italian readers not only to valuable works of literature but also to shape a better understanding of Chinese culture as a whole.

A novel in particular is a good example of this effort, also for the peculiar strategies developed in the publication.

Sellerio acquired world translation rights of Hong Bai Hei (Red White Black), in Italian A modo nostro [In Our Way] directly from the writer, who now lives in Canada. This is a unique case in recent international publishing, whose ramifications will be discussed in the presentation.

The novel was translated in Italian by Paolo Magagnin (University of Venice) and then, in agreement with the writer, deeply and extensively edited for a National (Italian) and International readership.

The editing followed a method that is very typical in American and British publishing, very less so in European countries. The editing procedure will be described in details. Sellerio was also responsible for selling the translation rights of the novel in foreign countries, submitting it to publishers, editors, and scouts worldwide and during the major bookfairs in London and Frankfurt.

The presentation will discuss what kind of novel A modo nostro is, its strengths and points of weakness, and why it was considered an important novel to be translated and published.

In the end the whole publishing event involved a Chinese writer, a Sicilian publisher, an Italian translator whose is also a Sinologist, an Italian editor that was also an Americanist, and a writer, Chen He, who became Honorary citizen of Palermo appointed by the mayor Orlando himself.

“Translation as a Place where the Soul is Made — Over a Hundred Years of Literary Translation from Japanese”

Gianluca COCI

Università degli Studi di Torino

“Participating in a place of spiritual work” (“Seishin no hataraki no ba ni sanka”): this is the title of an article about literary translation by Ōe Kenzaburō, published on the Asahi shinbun on September 19, 2006. Sensitive to the extraordinary importance of the translator's work (in his novels, for example, he never fails to mention the name of the translator, and often he discusses on the quality of the translation itself, whenever he quotes excerpts or lines from foreign works), Ōe says that he “feels a sense of complete psychophysical refreshment when he reads a book in the original version in parallel with the Japanese translation. The prominence of the literary translator's work is not yet evaluated enough, but undoubtly in the last few decades great improvements have been made, in particular in the context of the so-called “exotic languages”, which, until recent times, were treated as mysterious objects by most Italian publishers. Japanese fiction, due to a growing synergy between translators/scholars and publishers, as well as to the central role that the former are able to assume (there are fewer and fewer "passive" translators, who only carry out the assignment of the client, and more and more “active” "translators, who propose novels to be translated, interact with the authors, agents, publishing houses, etc.), reached a striking result in the last two years: about 30 books published a year, both in 2018 and in 2019, with an increase of more than 100% compared to the previous two decades. This is the result of a rapidly growing "movement", certainly linked to the deepening of the knowledge of the Japanese language and culture, and possibly supported by the massive didactic and research work carried out in many Italian universities. This movement of scholars devoted to Japanese language and literature proceeds parallel to the history of literary translation from Japanese and guarantees a progressive growth, as well as the consolidation of a "collective soul", that is a corpus of translations that are the result of an enormous amount of work, including research and efforts of many generations of scholars/translators.

I am honoured to act as the medium of this collective soul; taking the precious book Narrativa giapponese. Cent’anni di traduzioni [Japanese Narrative. One hundred years of translations] by Adriana Boscaro (2000) as solid ground, I will try first to describe the evolution and results of the history of literary translation from Japanese in Italy, which began about one and a half century ago (exactly in 1872, with the translation of Ukiyogata rokumai byōbu [Floating-World Style Six-Panel Screen] by Antelmo Severini), and today well beyond the threshold of 500 books published. Secondly, I will proceed to an analysis of the abovementioned new dynamics in the relationship between translators and publishing houses, as well as work methods and strategies for spreading Japanese narrative in Italy.

“Lost in translation - Dedicated to those who Tried to Subtitle the Duomo Sequence in Totò, Peppino e la malafemmina”

Marie Pierre DUHAMEL

Film curator, film translator

In today's world, cinema may be more than ever an international item: beyond what is called the language of cinema - an invention of the West that became a global praxis - technology has dramatically widened and accelerated the circulation of moving images. On the Internet, battalions of voluntary (young) translators type subtitles for videogames, tv-series and films in their own language, and never mind the result: rapid viewing and basic understanding are key. When talking about the professional well-trained translators committed to film subtitling, other problems arise. Contemporary Chinese films (including films from the PRC since the 80s) offer remarquable examples of the way cinema plays with dialects, local accents and all non-standardized expressive means, in a meaningful contrast with standard Mandarin (putonghua or guoyu). Yet subtitles are written language, they must be understandable by everyone, and follow precise technical requirements (limitations due to the necessary reading time; harmony with the rythm of the editing). The result is in some cases that a high percentage of the scenario and of the design of the characters is simply lost. In other cases, the historical, sociological and cultural specificities that film dialogs always carry with them may render entire sequences obscure to Western average audiences. Film distributors may then ask the translator to profoundly "adapt" the film dialog, ending up in some cases with the mere erasing of the filmmaker's intentions. The aesthetic and emotional qualities of a film will always prevail, and subtitling has always meant a loss, as all translations do. But in the specific case of cinema in the Chinese language(s) - and considering that dubbing creates more damage than it solves problems - it may seem legitimate to question what "understanding" a film means. Moreover, reflecting upon film subtitling and its impasses may contribute to a broader reflection upon the reality of the "universal language of cinema" and at a wider level yet upon the substance of the public's understanding of Chinese society.

“ ‘Ala lisan at-turjuman: processi e rappresentazioni di letteratura araba in Italia”

Jolanda GUARDI

Università degli Studi di Torino

As decolonial theory has clearly underscored, translation has been used more to shape the world than to join cultures and people (Italiano 2016) and to consolidate Western power (Mignolo 2012). Therefore, translation is always interrelated with decoloniality and translation from Arabic is no exception. In my paper, after situating my research in the field of Translation Studies, I will propose an itinerary from praxis – commenting on some examples of literary translations from Arabic which contribute in shaping an idea of the so-called Arab world – to theory. In doing so, I will focus on concept of negotiation in translation (Eco 2003) and on the role of the translator (Venuti 1999) showing how, in my opinion, translation from Arabic has still to be discussed in Italy.

“Translating Classic Arabic Grammatical Texts: The Kitāb Sībawayhi Project”

Giuliano LANCIONI

Università degli Studi Roma Tre

The Kitāb Sībawayhi Project (Lancioni et al. 2019) is a collaborative translation work which aims at a new English translation and analysis of the Kitab [Book], the earliest extant treatise of the Arabic linguistic tradition written by Sibawayhi in the late 8^th century AD (see Carter 2004). The project is based upon an innovative approach that will hopefully shed new light on how the Arabic linguistic system has been described by the first, and from many points of view, most prominent authority of the Arabic linguistic tradition (cf. Bohas, Guillaume, and Kouloughli 2006).

The translation will be based upon a novel lexicon-based approach, which starts from a number of medium-frequency words belonging to specific semantic fields, and proceeds with the analysis of the immediate context in which such words occur. This approach requires that the meaning of the word is established on the basis of its immediate context, by considering the word(s) and sentence(s) in closest proximity, and of the comparison of different contexts it appears in throughout the book. Unlike other translations and studies on the subject (since Jahn 1895), this approach does not programmatically consider additional literature to provide explanations of the linguistic themes addressed in the text.

The paper will address a number of theoretical, empirical and translational issues involved in the project, which will be illustrated by a number of examples chosen in order to be made understandable to a wider public who is not necessarily conversant with the history of the Arabic linguistic thinking.

"Translating Chinese Literature into Italian. ‘In a Word: while the Prospects are Bright, the Road has Twists and Turns’ ”

Alessandra LAVAGNINO

Università degli Studi di Milano Statale

In the domain of translation from Chinese Literature, Italy can claim a glorious and remarkable tradition: during Ming Dynasty, for example, Matteo Ricci and his Chinese friend Paolo Xu Guangqi for the first time provided translations in Latin language of the Chinese Classics, and in Chinese language of major Western scientific works, and dictionaries, grammars and any kind of useful tools to learn both Chinese and Latin were produced by Italian missionaries.

From the beginning of the 20^th century, unfortunately, our publishing industry became more and more parochial, retranslating Chinese works from previous translations in other Western languages. Nevertheless, from the beginning of the eighties this situation underwent significant changes following the opening of the country: new strands of research on China flourished and also commercial publishers showed a new interest on translations directly from Chinese literature. Some significant examples will be provided in the paper.

“Retranslations of Literary Works of Twentieth century Japan”

Andrea MAURIZI

Università degli Studi di Milano-Bicocca

Which are the reasons that lead translators to undertake a new translation, to rewrite what has already been written in the same language? There can exist innumerable answers, but what is most often evoked is the increasingly fragile appreciation of existing translations, summarized in an inevitable “aging” of translations. The theorists, the literary critics and the translators themselves agree in recognizing the transience of the translation and in attributing the cause of this fragility to linguistic factors.

The retranslation takes place mainly because, in the culture of the target language, the “situation of translation” changes partially or globally. The source text grows old as well, but not in the same way as translations do. It is renowned that the status of translations never reaches the authority of the original text, since the translations represent only possible interpretations of a certain text and therefore do not preserve its uniqueness. Moreover, not only does the language change, but also the tools available to the translators: the strengthening of lexicographical resources, together with a better competence of the foreign language, allows translators to work with greater ease and confidence. The technological advancement and professionalism of the translator can not guarantee a better translation indeed, but they all can contribute, together with a more detailed critical analysis of the work and its author, to a better understanding of the original text.

In my presentation I will try to highlight how the increased linguistic skills of translators, combined with the presence of more sophisticated research engines and lexicographical resources, nowadays allow to conduct retranslations of modern Japanese literature that are able to offer versions that not only are more faithful and respectful to the original texts, but also that permit to highlight the cultural and historical dimension that permeates the original works. The passages I will analyze will be taken from La madre del Comandante Shigemoto (Shōshō Shigemoto no haha) by Tanizaki Jun’ichirō and from Neve di primavera (Haru no yuki) by Mishima Yukio.

“Translating the Untranslatable. Intertextuality in Japanese Premodern Literature”

Carolina NEGRI

Università Ca’ Foscari Venezia

Because we attach great importance to originality finding embedded or transformed intertexts in Western literature is not as simple. Rather than make obvious the origins of the inspiration for their works Western authors very often seem to disguise or conceal their sources. On the other hand, in Japanese premodern literature being original, as we understand the term, is not the primary purpose of writing and the whole question of origin and source seems to be erased or at least obfuscated by the multiplicity of repetitions, both exact or transformed. To a Western reader addicted to originality the repetition of already existing lines of poetry or contents of prose works must seem indicative of a lack of creativity while in Japanese premodern literature originality through repetition may be considered a more refined form of creativity. Borrowing rather then a kind of recycling necessitated by a lack of resources, is a building up of allusions that create new effects from the juxtaposition of familiar fragments (Yamasaki Toyama 1990).

Utatane [Fitful Slumbers] (1260 ca.), a short prose work written in the Kamakura period (1185-1333) by nun Abutsu (1225?-1283?), is probably one of the most interesting example of the use of intertextuality in Japanese premodern literature. This work adopts a wide range of intertextual instances and successfully transforms them into a new material, continuing or altering original significances. The frequent presence of allusions and rewritings support the idea that Utatane may be approached as an elaborate work of translation from one culture (i. e. the culture of Heian period) to another (i. e. the culture of Kamakura period) in which the survival of imported items is ensured by the process of recontextualization.

This paper attempts to cast light on the process of intertextuality in Japanese premodern literature through a close reading of Utatane. It will focus in particular on the emotional-rhetorical function of intertextual strategies in this work and discuss the possibilities and methods to translate them into another language / culture.

“Translating the Arab Nahda: the case of Adib (1933) by Taha Husayn”

Maria Elena PANICONI

Università di Macerata

My contribution focuses on my translation of Adib (Adib. Storia di un letterato, Edizioni Ca’ Foscari 2017), the 1933 novel by the Egyptian author Taha Husayn (18891973). Egyptian historian, novelist, academic, translator, a Minister of the Education (1951-1952) and highly estimated intellectual during the first half of the Twentieth Century, Taha Husayn was also the author of an acclaimed autobiographical work, al-Ayyam [The Days] published between 1926 and 1927) translated into Italian by Umberto Rizzitano in 1965.

Adib takes place between Cairo and Paris and encompasses two narrative voices: the autobiographical voice of a young Azharite who, as in the author’s case, ends up studying in Paris, and the voice of the real protagonist of the story, the whimsical Adib, a man in his thirties, a civil servant of rural origins who is “consumed by the ailment of literature” and by the yearning to leave Egypt and go to Europe to complete his education. Once he obtains a scholarship to study in Paris, Adīb is caught in a moral dilemma and finds himself torn between the deep love for the countryside he grew up in, and the prospect of travelling and starting a new life in France.

The ultimate schizophrenia that compromises Adib’s health is the narrative metaphor for what the author perceived as a modern tendency to “embrace” European otherness to the point of losing his own self. Adib is a highly self-reflective text which raises questions about otherness and identity, freedom and modernity, questions that were fundamental in the Twenties and Thirties, when the authorial experience has been shaped and this text was conceived.

Building on the considerations articulated by Faiq, Van Leween and Rooke (Faiq 2004) about the cultural dimension in translating from Arabic into European Languages, I will present the attitude and the choices I have made in my translation of this still challenging text.

“Theoretical and Practical Reflections on the Re-translation of a Modern Classic of Chinese Literature”

Nicoletta PESARO

University Ca’ Foscari Venezia

Although there are already a few translations of Lu Xun’s 鲁迅 (1881-1936) short stories, the time has come to propose a new and more complete edition of his fiction within Chinese translated literature in Italian. Being an important part of modern China’s identity, Lu Xun’s thought and works are a powerful repertoire of cultural meanings and literary values, which can help Italian readers to define the cultural and historical context of Twentieth-Century’s China, mapping both its traditional and present-day society.

However, re-translating Lu Xun does not only respond to the need and desire of representing China’s multifaceted cultural identity to contemporary Italian readers. Borrowing one of the fourteen definitions of classics given by the Italian writer Italo Calvino (1981), we can claim that “[t]he classics are those books which come to us bearing the aura of previous interpretations, and trailing behind them the traces they have left in the culture or cultures (or just in the languages and customs) through which they have passed.”

In my paper I will discuss some aspects of my recent translation of Lu Xun’s short stories from the perspective of translation studies and the reception of cultures. If, quoting again and paraphrasing Calvino (1981), “[a] classic is a book which with each [re-translation] offers as much of a sense of discovery as the first [translation]”, then the main aim of the re-translation should be to disclose the “traces” that Lu Xun’s fiction has left in Chinese culture as well as the ones which could be left in Italian culture.

“Translation of Japanese Classical Poetry”

Ikuko SAGIYAMA

Università degli Studi di Firenze

Poetry translation entails some problems inherent to the specificity of the genre.

The poetry is much more compressed than fiction and its language is denser. The meaning and emotions can be conveyed through stylistic devices such as sound, rhythm, rhetorical figures, formal arrangement, connotations etc. Any of these elements can be a challenge for translator.

The shortness is particularly relevant in the case of classical Japanese poetry, waka. The most widely-composed type, tanka, the dominant form from the 7^th century to the present, consists of five lines in 31 syllables in the pattern 5-7-5-7-7. It is almost impossible to reproduce this metre in the translation. Morever, in the original text the poems are written without line break, therefore the translator has to decide whether to write the translated version into a single line as well, or to separate it into five lines. This question is related to the word order. The difference in syntax between Italian and Japanese forces the translators to make a choice: give priority to the flow of discourse or to the grammatical structure.

Another difficulty specifically concerning the translation of waka derives from the conspicuous presence of rhetorical devices, such as makurakotoba (“pillow words”), jokotoba (“preface words”), kakekotoba (“pivot word”), mitate (compound images of substitution), engo (“linked words”).

Furthermore, it should be pointed out that the poetic language of waka is rich in allusions, due to conventional connotations. Therefore, the literal translation often fails to convey poetic implications.

All these problems make the translation work very complicated, but at the same time also challenging.

“The Sound of Silence – Spaces, Silences and Untold in Manga Translation”

Anna SPECCHIO

Università degli Studi di Torino

Manga represent a relevant segment of the Italian market for comics, and the politics of its diffusion and translation have dramatically changed since their first appearance as a product of the newly emerging 80s pop-culture emerging (Berndt 2018; Buissou 2011; Ōgi 2018; Shodt 1983; Tosti 2016). The first genres imported from Japan were mainly shōnen and shōjo, primarily directed respectively to a readership of young boys and girls. Although the new millennium saw the emergence of new genres and subgenres, as well as a more mature way of drawing and narrating stories, shōjo manga in particular present features which remained unchanged and represent their charme, such as big-eyed protagonists, roses and laces that embellish the page, or – from a linguistic perspective – the use of onomatopoeia, one-word phrases or unfinished sentences to express feelings and thoughts. Peter Duus, in commenting Fredrik Shodt’s Manga! Manga! Manga! The World of Japanese Comics, said with regard of this way that “if not an accompliance of silence, the narrative comic is at least a companion of the inarticulate (ironically, even silence has its own signifier: shiiin)” (Duus 1984). Translating shōjo manga from Japanese to Italian means to reconstruct the dialogues so that the feelings and thoughts expressed in the balloons and the emotions shown in the images match up, even though the structure of the source language would require a different order and rendition to say almost the same thing in the target language. This presentation uncovers some challenges manga translator have faced, and the solutions they have proposed to maintain for an Italian readership the same source impact as that experienced by the Japanese original audience.

“Arabic Zoological Literature of the Middle Ages and Modern period: Seeking for Translations”

Cecilia VERACINI

CAPP – ISCSP Universidade de Lisboa

Pre-Islamic people developed a good knowledge of the fauna of the Arabic peninsula and much of these data and information are reported by some authors of the early Islamic period (e.g. al-Jahiz, 781- 869; al-Hamdani, 892 – 945) representing a very important and irreplaceable source of local knowledge that otherwise would have been lost after the advent of Islam. Indeed, much of the Islamic lore about some animals (e.g. hamadryad baboons who still live in the Arabic peninsula or more in general about monkeys) seems to have roots in pre-Islamic knowledge and myths, as for instance the prohibition to eat monkey flesh. During the Islamic “Golden Age” the so called Books of Animals (Kitab al-Hayawan) flourished. These works, having different influence and sources (pre-Islamic Arabian traditional knowledge, travellers' and sailors' tales, Greek scholars’ writings), are extremely relevant for history of zoology and natural history being an infinite repository of zoological information. The tradition of South Arabia trade in the Eastern Africa and Indian Ocean allowed since antiquity the Arabian world to enter in contact with other animal species besides the Arabian ones. The Arabian travel literature often reveals the first contacts and descriptions of animals and their behaviour that only after the European expansion would have been known in Europe. It should also be highlighted the first proto-evolutionist ideas that emerge from many of Arabic zoological treatises which have remained, because of their difficult of use, almost unknown for a long time. Many of these Arabic sources are found in old English translations, others in French editions sometime of difficult consultations as online reading is not always possible. Moreover, it is really difficult for not-Arabian speakers to understand the quality and reliability of the different editions and translations. The aims of this communication is to show the importance of these sources both for the history of zoology and for contemporary culture and to pinpoint how a good systematic translation could facilitate the dissemination and use by scholars of such texts so important for the history of human thought.